The Activist
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Description
This week, Kiki, Hoja, and Mohanad unpack CBS’s reality TV nightmare, The Activist. They dissect it all: from the competition aspect, to the celebrity judges, and the Internet outrage. Listen to them analyze apologies from Global Citizen, Priyanka Chopra, and Julianne Hough… and quietly side-eye Usher’s absolute silence. Plus, an interview with 22-year-old climate activist Clover Hogan, who went through the bizarre audition process for the show.
Please note, I’m Sorry contains mature themes and may not be appropriate for all listeners.
Keep up with all of Clover’s activism at her website: https://www.cloverhogan.com/.
To learn more about Force of Nature, check out https://www.forceofnature.xyz/.
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Need help saying sorry? Got any public apology fodder? Email us at imsorry@lemonadamedia.com or send us a DM on Instagram.
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For additional resources, information, and a transcript of the episode, visit lemonadamedia.com.
Transcript
SPEAKERS
Kiki Monique, Clover Hogan, Mohanad Elshieky, Hoja Lopez
Hoja Lopez 00:08
Hello, everyone and welcome to I’M SORRY, a podcast about apologies. I’m Hoja Lopez and this week, I am staying in a child’s room with many toys and honestly it takes me back. I’m feeling nostalgic. I want to regress to a part of myself where I don’t have to do anything. And other people bathed me.
Mohanad Elshieky
Wow. I think that’s called being rich. But yeah, this is Mohanad Elshieky. And this week, I’m just extremely happy that summer is over. Because that season sucks. I said it. No one’s brave enough to say it. If you’re listening and you’re offended by this, send me a DM, we’ll talk about it.
Kiki Monique
And I’m Kiki Monique. And ironically, because summer has ended, I have had a Slurpee every single day. I’m trying to hold on to every bit of summer.
Hoja Lopez
Okay, what is a Slurpee?
Kiki Monique
Have you been to 7/11?
Hoja Lopez
Yes.
Kiki Monique
Okay, so like you go to the machine where they have the Big Gulps. Next to it is a freezie big gulp. And it’s just frozen ice sugar.
Hoja Lopez
I don’t think I’ve ever had one. But I will try one and report back. Well, talking about activism, we’re not actually sitting, we’re talking about Slurpee’s. I am so excited to introduce this episode’s theme. I’m so excited about this in particular, because I feel like it blew up a couple of weeks ago, and I was so curious about it. So today we’re gonna be talking about the activist, which is a competition series that came out of CBS and global citizens. And ultimately, global citizens produced the show, but then CBS actually purchased it. So it didn’t need somebody at CBS had to actually pay money for the show, which just to kind of explain it fully. You know, it’s a competition series. So yes, reality TV, then they basically work together to bring meaningful change to three vitally important world causes. So one of them being health, education, and then the environment. So the idea for them was that these activists are going to go kind of head-to-head and challenges, promote their causes. And then somehow, kind of at the end of every show, their success is sort of measured via online engagement and social metrics, as well as the input from Priyanka Julian and Usher. Yeah, you know, we’ll find out eventually, who is actually going to be on the show. But I mean, just off the basis of that, what the hell were they thinking? Like, what is going on? That seems insane.
Mohanad Elshieky 02:37
I’d say they were not thinking. That’s the biggest issue here.
Kiki Monique
I mean, I think if you okay, if you like, again, I love some bad reality TV. So when you mood board it out, in theory, it seems like this might work. I mean, for people who’ve worked in these competition shows where we’ve seen people do I mean, Survivor, thinking about when Survivor came out, you know, people eating rats and bugs in order to win, you know, a million dollars. Like, that’s far-fetched. That’s outlandish, but we were like, all behind it.
Mohanad Elshieky
Absolutely. And, you know, I think reality TV shows, we all watched them. They’re fun to watch. But I think after this whole year with the pandemic, and just like knowing the dangers of climate change, and actually seeing them and everything, I think people were just like, terrified of these things that are happening to us. And then I feel like the final straw was just seeing those people with money, trying to turn everyone’s work into a game and make money out of it. Yeah. And everyone’s just like, okay, you know what, I’m done here. We’re not gonna do this.
Hoja Lopez
Yeah, it definitely feels like oh, you know how there’s like sequels. And people keep making different, like the same movies and we’re just kind of out of ideas like we’ve reached the end of it, or at the very end of the internet and of television. And we’ve reached this idea, and it seems particularly heinous to me, but the comments online are incredible. I’ve been reading just the funniest most engaging shit online about it. And it’s because it really prompts itself up to so much ridicule.
Mohanad Elshieky 04:18
Absolutely. Yeah, the second I saw that deadline article when it popped up. I immediately knew this is not gonna go well. I was like, this is gonna get more replies than likes which is never a good sign.
Hoja Lopez
Never a good sign.
Kiki Monique
Can I ask you guys like serious question? Okay, not a serious I’m never at that serious. I remember during the pandemic, I actually attended some virtual sort of like, raise, you know, for hunger or something that we like, bid on through our text messages and stuff and it was like a whole star-studded event. And you know, I think back to like my childhood, a lot of those like, telephones and like those weird things. They had a lot of like, rich people. involve because that was the only way people were willing to give because like, we are in the society where it’s like, okay, you want me to give something? Well, what do I get for giving you something, right? And so, in my head, I think that’s where, you know, CBS and maybe even, you know, global citizen and Live Nation, like, where they were thinking like, okay, if we put these big names behind it, then people will be more willing to watch and get involved.
Mohanad Elshieky
Absolutely. But to your point, though, put big names behind it. But I feel like those big names should also have any relation to activism. You know, like, even if you put someone like Leonardo DiCaprio, he’s been talking about climate change for so long. And I’m not saying he should, but like, at least, you know, there’s a reason behind it to why he’s being put on a show like this. Because the main criticism wasn’t only about the idea of the show, it was also about the judges. Like some of them were like, yeah, I know nothing about activism. I just wanted to be part of this.
Hoja Lopez 06:01
It definitely seems like the selection of judges is strange in that way. But I think for sure, Kiki, what you’re saying is right, just in the sense of like, how do we actually call attention to the issues? I think it’s just so misguided not to. It’s almost like when you go to a job, and you know how to do something better than your boss, but your boss still signs your paycheck and tells you how to improve stuff like these activists are going to go on this show, get feedback from Usher on what like, what is Yeah, sure going to offer these activists other than this platform, nothing like these activists can probably offer Usher a lot more advice on I don’t know, just a plethora of things I’m sure he could improve on in his personal life.
Kiki Monique
And that’s what’s like, so sad, because like, I read in one of these articles, you know, these activists, they just want to get their message out there in any way, shape, or form. And one of the activists who had been selected apparently had set up a GoFundMe in order to be able to go out and record the show, because you know, it’s going to take, I guess, a few weeks of filming, and they’re not going to be working, and they needed funds to be able to like go out there and do that. And it’s so sad that this corporation wants to use these activists, you know, say to give them a platform, but they’re not even willing to pay them to like, film them. Do this whole tap dance, this whole, you know, charade, but like, I’m sure, Usher, and Julianne, and Priyanka are making huge paychecks.
Mohanad Elshieky
Absolutely. Yeah. And it’s just, it’s not because activism is not supposed to be a show. And I am sure like a lot of people like who do this work, they are not going to tell you that it is fun work or but it’s necessary. And they do it because of that. And you know, and they’re already competing. The competition element is already there. Because like you have to apply for grants. And you have to literally just try to get the funding and just basically like borderline like, beg people for the money and to take that struggle and just be like, you will get your money if these three celebs like it enough. And you know, like people like making jokes about it. They’re like, okay, so if I don’t get enough likes Usher’s gonna be like, yeah, I guess we’re not gonna fix climate change. What 200 likes was that, was gonna let it happen.
Hoja Lopez 08:25
I saw a comment on social media that was like, watches two orphans battle it out, because only one can be selected and adopted by Lovely Mike and Linda from Cleveland. And I just thought to myself, like, you can’t televise that level of pain and that level of depth of social issue. So they have to stay light, right? Like, I cannot imagine that they can get into like, the depth of what these issues are actually causing because they don’t want to be a frickin bummer on TV.
Mohanad Elshieky
And I think it’s also very interesting that two of the judges you know, like release statements and just be like, you know, like, we listened, we hear you, we understand the critique and everything. And Usher just didn’t say anything, which was very funny to me, because he was like, he was like, hey, man, I got my paycheck. You guys do your internet thing. I don’t care.
Kiki Monique
Well, that’s the thing. It’s like so they were they went from I don’t even know how many episodes this is probably going to be I don’t know, we’ll say 13 episodes, right? And then there’s like this, they’re gonna premiere it. There’s all this backlash though. They’re like, okay, never mind, we’re not going to do this anymore. We’re going to revamp it. We’re going to take it back. We’re going to refilm and we’re going to turn this into just like a, I guess a one-day documentary. That’s not a competition. It’s just going to be focused on these activists that we originally use, and just focusing on their efforts, and we’re gonna give him the money that we were gonna give him already, but we’re just gonna give it to them. And it’s kind of like, okay, but I don’t know like, is anyone gonna watch I mean, that’s my fear is like, is anyone now going to watch this? Because I feel like oh, I don’t know.
Mohanad Elshieky 10:06
To me what it sounded like and like having worked in TV that they were just like they got together and they were like, okay, how do we continue making money out of this without making everyone angry? Because we need to make the money back. So this is the best idea we could, because literally, I would say 90% of the people on the internet who replied to it, don’t want to watch it. But they were like, no, no, we’re committed to this. We’re committed to this bad idea. You’re gonna see it in a documentary.
Kiki Monique
I still can’t imagine they’re I still think they’re gonna bleed money from it because I stayed just like I don’t know but I don’t think it’s gonna succeed and I think it was obviously a reactionary response like so there wasn’t any strategy behind it, there’s no thinking behind it. At least I guess the positive is that these activists will still get a platform and they will get money to use and so that’s ultimately what we all wanted and so that will be the great part that comes out of all of this but yeah, I mean, like you know, their response you know, they did sort of like a release a combined statement, but you know, The Activist, CBS, Global Citizen, and Live Nation and it was like, you know, your standard very good response, we’re going to do the right thing, you know, blah, blah, blah, and then, you know, Priyanka, she sort of just did like this very basic textbox that I think someone just sort of like wrote for her. It just they didn’t, I didn’t feel it, you know, it was just like, okay, let me post it up. And I’m done. Usher, dead silent, like nothing to say, like you said, like, I got my paycheck. And where’s the next one coming?
Hoja Lopez
Every time a celebrity doesn’t apologize. I always imagined that meme of like Homer Simpson backing into a bush, you know, like, if I just quietly exit this room and Irish Goodbye my way out of this problematic situation. Nobody will call me out. And honestly, he’s right. I think in so many ways, like the I’ll call it like the Trump approach which is like never apologize. Never say you did anything wrong and then hope that this leaves the minds of young people very quickly and honestly with Usher, I think that will be the case. With Priyanka and Julianne. I don’t know so much.
Kiki Monique 12:23
I just really saw Usher in a whole new light. Like it just really came off as he’s just sort of like a dick. Because like to not just address it at all. Is it like backing away silently, because he’s still posting other stuff. He’s doing other stuff. So Julianne Hough, she actually I really, like she was the first she was the first to actually apologize. And hers. I actually think that she did this, like, sure. I’m sure she had some help. But she, this was her words. And you know, like, this isn’t the first time she’s had to apologize. I mean, like, and it comes up in her apology, cuz like back in 2013. she’d gone to a Halloween party. And this is when Orange is the New Black was like the biggest show. And she dressed up as Crazy Eyes, you know, who’s a DuBose character Crazy Eyes, shows up at this Halloween party in blackface.
Kiki Monique
And, obviously, that was like a whole thing and her apology back then, you know, it was fine for what it was it was very basic and included words like it certainly was never my intention, that sort of thing. But in this apology that she did about The Activist, I mean, she really sat there and addressed every single thing. I’m gonna read a few lines from her apology. She said, after the press release announcing The Activist I heard you say that the show was performative, promoted pseudo activism over real activism, felt tone deaf, like Black Mirror The Hunger Games, and that the hosts weren’t qualified to assess activism, because we are celebrities and not activists. I heard you say there was hypocrisy in the show, because at the root of activism is a fight against capitalism, and the trauma that it causes so many people that the show itself felt like a shiny capitalistic endeavor.
Kiki Monique 14:18
And because of this, there was a feeling of insult dehumanization, insensitivity and hurt that is being rightfully felt. I do not claim to be an activist and wholeheartedly agree that the judging aspect of the show missed the mark and furthermore, that I am not qualified to act as a judge. On top of all of this, many people are just becoming aware that I wore blackface in 2013, which only further added insult to injury. So she knew that this blackface thing was going to come up and she addressed it and she was like, I know that this has come up. And you know, I understand that and so I love that she just was like, I am not going to hide from this. I’m going to address every single thing, and I don’t know, I thought it was such a good apology.
Mohanad Elshieky
I thought it was sincere as well.
Hoja Lopez
Just as a side note, the same year that this happened my HR director at a job that I had also dresses blackface at my job, the job that I went to. I said something to him, I was like, hey, you’re actually wearing blackface, and you’re the literal HR director of this company. So you can’t do that. And he kind of was kind of laughed it off. And then, you know, took it off whenever he felt like it.
Kiki Monique
Also the wildest part of that story about what I read was that it was Eileen Fisher’s Halloween party, or she was there. And supposedly, she saw Julianne, and was like, mortified, and was like, please go get this off immediately. Eileen Fisher. Yeah. Now in the in the article, her reps deny that she did this. But I’m like, why? I mean, she should. She’s like, she was mortified. She wanted her to not be caught out her friend caught out and get pictures.
Mohanad Elshieky 16:04
Not a bad thing to say, yeah. I just cannot imagine anywhere this was not a bad thing to do. Like to just attend a party or a place and have no one approach you and be like, hey, this is not good. You shouldn’t do that.
Hoja Lopez
I know. Come on. I know, it’s hard to call out your friends and for people pleasers out there. But sometimes you got to take a girl by the ear to a bathroom and put a sponge to her face. Yeah, but I know I really enjoyed her apology as well. I feel like it is such a multi-pronged reason why the activist was such a bad idea. And I think that to a certain extent, she really tried to attack each part of it. And one of my favorite reasons to go back to the reason why I think people did sign on in the first place is, she says that it feels important for her to share. The reason that she signed on was because she was excited to be a part of something that highlights and is centered around sharing activists work on a larger platform. So I think that I mean, they didn’t know it was a competition. So that in and of itself is already like, a big red flag. But even still, it’s likely that they don’t have a complete idea of what the show is gonna come off like afterwards.
Mohanad Elshieky
Yeah, that being said, everyone please tune in to my show, the immigrant starring me. And Hoja has also presenter on it. And you know,
Kiki Monique
I get to determine whether you get a green card or not. It’s a black female host, very diverse.
Hoja Lopez
I can’t wait till it gets picked up by CBS.
Kiki Monique 18:03
For this next segment, we reached out to someone who actually went through the casting process for The Activist. Her name is Clover Hogan. She’s a 22-year-old climate activist, and eco anxiety researcher, and the founder and executive director of a really incredible organization called force of nature, which is a youth nonprofit, mobilizing climate action. We’re so excited to have her join us. Hi, Clover.
Clover Hogan
Hello.
Kiki Monique
Thank you so much for being here. Before we dive into the big stuff, we’d really like to know a little bit more about you and the work you do.
Clover Hogan
Sure, yeah. Well, thank you so much for having me on. So I grew up in the tropics, in Australia, very much in a living room with three walls, so I spent more time outside than in. y’all are American, but in Australia, all the rumors are true about the animals. So I grew up fishing frogs out of the toilet and dodging snakes that hung from the ceiling, I used to go out and rescue beach sea turtles. And so I was very lucky that I had that relationship,
Kiki Monique
Are the spiders really as big as like basketballs, because that’s what I know about Australia.
Clover Hogan
Yeah, so we have the bird eating spider, which I mean, it’s kind of in the name. Yeah, we have all the creepy crawlies. We have all the animals, but that just, it filled me with so much like awe and wonder growing up. I couldn’t get enough of it. And I guess that background to why it came in such a shock to me when I learned what we were doing to the natural world. So I grew up watching documentaries, you know, watching The Cove and An Inconvenient Truth. And I sat as this little girl glued to my computer screen. Staring at these images of million-year-old forests being bulldoze to produce Big Macs, and graphs projected by Al Gore that showed how quickly we were destroying the planet. And so it was at 11 that I declared to my parents over dinner that I want to become an environmentalist. and commit the rest of my life to that work. And that’s really what I’ve been doing ever since. At 19, I founded Force Of Nature, which was really born out of the recognition that the threat even greater than climate changes how powerless so many of us can feel in the face of it, because it’s so overwhelming. It’s so complex. And of course, until we mobilize mindsets, until we shift the way that we think about the issues and see their intersectionality, we won’t be able to solve it. So everything we do is that working with young people around the world and enabling young people to engage with decision makers walk the corridors of power to really shift from anxiety to action.
Kiki Monique 20:39
What did your parents say when at age 11? You make this big? I mean, I think I was like asking for a Snoopy skateboard like, what are they like? Are they just surprised?
Clover Hogan
It’s a good question. So my first declaration after environmentalist was I’m going to go vegetarian, because I just watched a documentary about mass animal agriculture. And my dad is French, and he’s also a chef. So for him, this was I was rejecting everything that he had. So I think he was like, just completely ashen. And honestly, it took many years, I guess, it’s still taken up until very recently for him to kind of come to terms with it. But you know, they, apart from that small fact that they could not have been more supportive, because when I was 13, they allowed me to coerce them into moving to Indonesia, so that I could go to a place called the Green School, which is more or less bamboo classrooms in the middle of the jungle. And that was really my Launchpad into activism and grassroots mobilizing.
Kiki Monique
Wow. I mean, I have been child free by choice. But if I didn’t have a kid, so they could convince me to move to Indonesia, I might rethink this whole thing.
Clover Hogan
Yeah, I don’t think they were too reluctant.
Mohanad Elshieky
So obviously, you know, speaking of activism that you will reach out to, by the show The Activist, which is a topic for our episode today. So how did it all start? How did they reach out to you? What did they say at first? And can you tell us more about that?
Clover Hogan 22:09
Yeah, so we’ve had a growing profile over the past couple of years. And as a youth organization, we get heaps of requests every single day, podcast interviews, you know, documentaries, that kind of stuff. And so it was another one of those requests, someone reached out and said, they were making a TV show to really celebrate activism and bring together activists and bring attention to a series of issues from hunger, world hunger and poverty to the environment to health. And why this one was quite interesting is that it kind of came from Global Citizen, someone speaking on behalf of Gobal Citizen, and we’ve done engagements with them before and I’ve only ever had really positive experiences. So like a number of requests, we followed up with a bit of clarifying information, and I personally agreed to take a call with them.
Mohanad Elshieky
So what did they say in the initial call when you talk to them at first?
Clover Hogan
They were very evasive. That’s how I described it when I kind of like popped off on Twitter. They pretty much every question I asked, you know, what is the purpose of this show? Or how you going to go about platforming diverse activists? Or, you know, what’s the kind of end goal here was responded to in a really, really evasive way. And so naturally, I had a bit of a question mark. But at the same time, we’ve never really done anything like this before. Like we’ve done a heap of panels, we’ve, you know, done documentaries before, but nothing like a TV show. And so, in my mind, I was like, okay, well, maybe it’s so early on in the process, that they’re just like under NDA, they can’t really say too much. And perhaps in this context, that’s just like the entertainment industry. But they really kept impressing what a huge opportunity, this would be for Force Of Nature. And for us, everything that we do is really, how do we get youth voices out there? And how do we take the conversation around eco anxiety and the climate crisis mainstream? So we agreed to another conversation with them. They said we’ll be able to put you in contact with someone else from the production team who will be able to answer all of your questions.
Kiki Monique 24:14
Well, when someone comes to you, especially with like a huge name, and with everything going on in the world, you think you know people saying they want to make these changes that are performative? Even though it may be evasive, it seems like okay, I want to give it a chance because like, how many opportunities do you get to like, get out there like this? So I think anyone would jump on the chance.
Clover Hogan
Yeah, I think so. And you know, that’s a huge part of what all of us do as activists is how do we get these issues into the mainstream and the idea of like a major for network talking about the climate crisis, platforming activists. I mean, there wasn’t really anything that sounded bad or wrong about it.
Mohanad Elshieky
Yeah. But you had like you had no idea at first that it was a competition.
Clover Hogan
Oh, God, no. I would run 100 miles in the opposite direction if I’d known that from the get go, yeah.
Mohanad Elshieky
So like, what was the, what would you say was like the first red flag for you?
Clover Hogan
Yeah. So I mean, retrospectively, there were red flags from the beginning, but it didn’t become so abundantly clear until this follow up conversation. So I agreed to having this conversation with a view of learning more about the show, maybe speaking to someone you know, who knew a little bit more about the production itself. And so I hopped on to this conversation, which is kind of framed as an interview, I could ask them questions, they’d ask some questions of me. And from the get go, it was really, really bizarre. So I got asked the pretty basic question which I get asked a lot, which is, you know, who are you? How did you come through the work that you’re doing today. And so I shared my story, a slightly expanded version of what I shared here today around what my catalyst was, I really spoke to the kind of moments of heartbreak that I’ve experienced as an activist, both learning about the issues, but of course, watching the fires back home in 2019, which triggered a bit of an emotional breakdown for me, kind of looking down at my phone and seeing 2 billion animals incinerated by the inferno, you know, seeing stories on friends, Instagram’s of them standing on tin roofs, you know, as their homes got consumed by the flames.
Clover Hogan 26:18
And so I really spoke to the kind of the, my experience of activism and all of these emotional pulse points that have led to the work that I do today. And as I watched this guy’s face, as I always responding to this question, he seemed to become increasingly irritated. And he looked a little bit frustrated. And I’m right, as I was saying, the last kind of sentence, he cut me off toward the end. And he was like, no, no, no, no, that’s just not working, that he seemed really, really frustrated. And he’s like, no, I want to hear I want to hear the sob story. Like, I want to hear, you know, what was that moment that broke you, you know, what was that moment that like, changed everything. And it was very dramatized. And he even kind of modeled to me an example of what he wanted to hear. And so I was like, oh, okay, I can re explain it, maybe I’ll give it slightly shorter version or I’ll focused on that catalyst moment. But basically, he repeated this routine, like over and over until I was reliving those moments on camera. And it was so dramatized. And so triggering, for me personally, like talking about something super vulnerable.
Clover Hogan
And that is just, frankly, really difficult to talk about, that I just like burst into tears on camera. And that was the moment where he’s like, yes, perfect. That’s the shot. So that was probably the worst interview I’ve ever done. It became super clear in that moment that he didn’t want to hear my story or get to know, you know, why I do the work that I do. He wanted a narrative and he was trying to get me to fit into that narrative. And he wouldn’t stop kind of hounding me with questions until he got what he wanted. And that really like emotional response. And it was again, just like downhill from there, I think retrospectively, and I reflected on this, I wish I’d had the self-awareness and also like, the self-respect, saying that moment, enough is enough. And I really don’t want to do this anymore. This is really uncomfortable. But I think it’s always challenging when you’re in that kind of power dynamic. And when you’re questioning yourself like the whole time, I think I was like gaslighting myself a bit, I was like maybe this is just like the entertainment industry. Like maybe this is totally normal. Maybe he’s just trying to help me be a better storyteller. Like, I don’t know what’s going on.
Kiki Monique 28:36
Well, the thing is, I think it is actually normal. That’s the sad part like it is entertainment industry, it is normal. And maybe that needs to not be the norm.
Mohanad Elshieky
Yeah. Yeah, it’s insane because this seems like less about activism and more like how they do it and like show like America’s Got Talent and stuff, where they do not care what you’re singing about, but like, what made you sing and you just have to be like, everyone around me died. And that’s why I’m doing this. It’s just like, okay, cool, but I want to know what they’re doing.
Kiki Monique
Yeah, it’s like, I don’t know how many days I spent, like crying over the koalas because that was like the image here in America we saw was like, all the koalas and it’s like, this producer trying to force you into like thinking about these like terrible koalas until you cry. I mean, that’s awful.
Clover Hogan
Yeah, it was not fun. I think it’s, it’s really challenging because so much of my work is around mental well-being and everything that I do is to try and normalize these spaces where young people in particular affected communities, you know, feel empowered to be vulnerable and like, speak from the heart and talk about how difficult it is, I think there’s such power in that, but when it becomes like commodified or when there’s some kind of like agenda, to use that story for someone else’s purpose. It can be really degrading and disempowering, and he just kept going on in that kind of vein throughout the entire interview and even after that question, it wasn’t actually until the end, where he asked me. So how would you go about winning this competition? That I just like stopped dead in my tracks. I was like, competition? Like, what are you talking about? And then it all came to light that this was effectively a challenge show competition to get activists to basically buy for the same pot of funding and compete not compete to the death, but almost felt like getting out of hunger games.
Kiki Monique 30:35
Or I like to call it Battle Royale. The original Hunger Games.
Clover Hogan
Yeah, exactly, exactly. And that’s honestly what it sounded like. And I think, you know, even at one point, you know, a lot of the work that I do as a climate activist is like, you know, in decision making spaces, in classrooms, I attend protests, but I’m not the one who organizes them. I have friends who do that who are amazing at it, amazing at community mobilizing, but he wanted me to be a community mobilizer. And he kept saying, okay, but tell me about a time you’ve organized a protest. And I’m like, I’ve never actually done that before. Like, I’ve attended them. But I can’t like take claim for that. And he’s like, no, no, but surely, you know, you’ve gotten a group of people together, you know, you’ve stood on the soapbox, you’ve done that whole thing. And I was like, no, like, you’re clearly not listening to anything that I’m saying here. But again, I think they just wanted to take this conversation, cut it down into a convenient narrative, where I could show on camera that I’m capable of like, crying on the spot and being broken, you know, and they could turn that into a story for their producer.
Kiki Monique
Well, he’s building it up as the slideshow. He’s envisioning like you standing on a podium somewhere, like ripping something. Like it’s the whole image thing.
Clover Hogan
Exactly. I think he wanted like a Gretta 2.0. And, like, the beauty of this movement is its diversity. And we all have our different faces in it. But they came into that conversation with an agenda and they left with one and, you know, after it, I found the whole thing just very upsetting.
Kiki Monique 32:02
How long do this interview go and like until you he finally told you the competition part was just like an hour, four hours?
Clover Hogan
It felt like hours, it felt like torture. But no, it was an hour-long conversation. And it was right at the end. It was honestly in the last like 5, maybe 10 minutes of the conversation that he brought to light it was a competition. And, you know, I think I was like increasingly irritated up until this point. And he could like sense that in me as well. But I’m like, I just don’t know why I’m here. I don’t know why, like you’ve invited me here. And then once he said that, I was like, basically have a nice day, and I hope to never hear from this production company again.
Kiki Monique
What did you just tell him then at that moment, like, you know, like, I’m out?
Clover Hogan
No, I didn’t, you know, I wish that I had, I wish that I could have just been like really badass, and like, clap back at them and be like, this whole thing has been so problematic. But I just felt like really shaken up. And I just wanted to like go and cry in a corner, basically, which I did I like called my mom and she was like, oh, it sounds like you’ve you know, dodged a major bullet, you know, think of how they would have like co-opted your story and everything else. And I told my boyfriend and some friends about it. And in fact, I kind of like put it out of my mind completely and forgot about the whole thing. I assumed that because he had seen so irritated with me at so many points, that they just wouldn’t never contact me again. So it was actually hugely surprising when on my birthday, June 15th, I get this text on my WhatsApp. And it’s like Clover, we’ve been trying to contact you on all platforms, Instagram, Twitter, email, you know, you’ve been successful for The Activist, we want you to come on the show all of this, but we need to know by like, end of day, and I literally said to them, I’m like, thanks for considering me, I have no interest in this opportunity.
Clover Hogan
But like, all the best with your lives, basically, I’m like, I really don’t want to engage with this whatsoever. And that was when the follow up messages came of, you know, this would be a huge mistake, you’re missing out on a huge opportunity. You should re-think this, oh, yeah, of course, of course, which I’m definitely used to So, you know, I wish this could be an isolated opportunity. But unfortunately, we engage in these spaces all the time where young voices are either, you know, tokenized, or made to feel guilty or used for some other agenda. So at this point, I was just like, really jaded with it. And then very recently, a few weeks ago, my friend sent me this message on Instagram and it was a screenshot of the PR announcement of The Activist with Usher and Priyanka Chopra, and she’s like, is this the show you called me about? And of course it was. So here we are.
Kiki Monique 34:38
I have to wonder like, you know, you’re from Australia, not from America. And you’re so young. Not as an insult, but like you’re really young. And I think a lot of people your age would see this opportunity is like, I just want to get on any way shape or form. I think that’s just how we think in America. It’s like, even if it felt gross in the moment, I don’t know I think we do it and I might really impressed. I mean, I don’t think I could have done it at 22. I’ll be honest, I might have been like, sell by soul, I wouldn’t done it.
Clover Hogan
You know what I think I very well could have been in that position. You know, a few years ago, I think it’s only from the benefit of having done enough like speaking engagements and having had enough bad experiences that, you know, I picked up on the red flags when I did, but I wish I’d picked up on them sooner. And I’m glad I didn’t go ahead with it. But yeah, it wasn’t, it wasn’t a fun experience. And I also feel for the activists who did end up going on to the show, and I’d never want any of this rhetoric, you know, aimed at them or against them, because I know how easy it is to get sucked into that. And when you are in an unequal power dynamic to go, Okay, well, I just need to set myself aside and focus on getting my message out there or getting the cause out there. So I think they would be in a really typical position right now as well.
Mohanad Elshieky
Well, good thing it’s not happening anymore. I mean, it took five days for it to just, you know, implode and people just being like, this is a bad idea. Especially like when you see what like the judges are and stuff like that, like no one has ever been like, yeah, Usher big climate activists.
Clover Hogan 36:12
Honestly, every part of it was just so gross. Like, not only are we getting, okay, like being an activist, you never know, if you’re going to get a consistent paycheck. Like you never know, if you’re going to get enough funding, like you go into this like job, if you can call it that, knowing there are so many risks, knowing that you have to vie for the same pots of funding and everything else, you know, and it’s so disrespectful to, you know, I come from a bubble of absolute climate privilege, right? I have friends who are activists in South America in places like Sao Paulo or Kenya, for that matter, where activism is a very real threat to their lives, right? This is not some fun competition. This is like I’m doing this work, knowing that I could die for it. And so to kind of fetishize that and turn it into this, you know, competition show, and then for the success of those activists to be through the metric of like how successful they are in social media is tokenizing, is disrespectful. It’s like disillusioning. So I’m really relieved that it has been pulled. It’s great to see, I think in this instance, that like cancel culture can be a real really positive force for change. Because this kind of stuff happens all the time. And it’s just in this particular instance, that it really came to light and that people put their foot down and really said, this is not okay, this is not gonna fly
Kiki Monique
That like that was like one of my favorite quotes I read in an article you did was we’re in a culture that prioritizes consumption and competition over collaboration and community. And that really struck me because I was like, you’re right. Like I again, I love reality shows. And I don’t know if maybe I would have probably watched it if there wasn’t this outwardly backlash, because I consume a lot. I really do. I’m like, what is this about? And I’ll talk shit about it. And I’m like, this is terrible. This is horrible. But like, just from that perspective, so it was great that so many people realize like, no this is wrong.
Clover Hogan 38:07
Exactly. And I guess you have to ask, like, who does this serve at the end of the day? And, you know, it’s not like watching a show like this is going to inspire people to like, put their hands in the mud and like, do the work and like, get involved. You know, and I think, if anything, it can kind of perpetuate a bit of apathy. Because you’re like, oh, okay, there are some people doing some things like I can continue, like sitting on the couch, like not engaging with the issues, not using my voice and my platform. And again, I think it’s just like this epitome of like corporate America, which is like, let’s turn it into something that sells and rather than using the enormous amount of funding that goes into production, to actually support activists and like fund their work, you know, let’s use it for optics and let’s use it to bring on board people like Usher and Priyanka Chopra. So yeah, it’s I think it’s very timely as well. I think people are frustrated. And I think people are becoming that much better at kind of like calling it out when it does come too light. But yeah, I really hope they’ve learnt from this experience. I mean, I’m not super optimistic on that front. But I at least hope Global Citizen as an organization recognizes why this was so problematic.
Kiki Monique
Yeah, I mean, I think that like we’ve spent decades, so many decades in this, like, raising awareness, phase one, right? Like we’ve been raising awareness for decades and decades and decades. And now we’re all aware, like, I think we’ve gotten to the point we are all aware. And now we need to get to like phase two and three, where we’re like doing stuff, and corporations don’t know how to do that.
Clover Hogan
Absolutely. And we have those kind of conversations all the time, you know, with business leaders as Force Of Nature. And you know, we’ve been invited into a lot of those spaces where what comes is super intuitive to many of the young people we work with. It’s like you’re having to hold the hands of these decision makers. Like walk them through it and be like, here’s why it’s really problematic to put out, you know, a diversity campaign where you have, you know, all of these diverse faces not reflect any of that in your hiring process, or here’s why like, greenwash is like not cool and why young people are gonna call you out for it. And so I think, you know, social media, I’ve seen cancel culture swing in the opposite direction, even in this instance, right, like people who are trying to cancel the people who are involved in the show, like the participants themselves. But at the same time, I think social media can be this like, incredible vehicle and mobilizer. And I think we’ve seen that with, you know, Black Lives Matter. We’ve seen it with the youth strikes for climate. And when people realize that our voices in collective have power to really challenge the institution, and they change as a result of it, that is incredibly empowering.
Mohanad Elshieky 40:51
I mean, there’s nothing more I can add to that. I mean, the conclusion of it was, was great.
Clover Hogan
I’m glad, well, thank you, and thank you for helping me laugh about it as well. Because, you know, at the time, it was very upsetting, but now I just look at like how ridiculous it is. And yeah, I mean, we have to laugh at how silly it is, or else it’s just, if you’re not gonna laugh, you’re gonna cry.
Kiki Monique
And now our favorite part of the week, sorry, not sorry. This week, I owe an apology to my English teachers because I just now realize that I have been saying, windy road instead of winding road. And as somebody who really likes to correct people’s English, like when I hear supposably, I lose my mind. I’m a bit mortified that I’ve been saying windy road.
Mohanad Elshieky 42:08
I don’t even know what that is to be honest.
Hoja Lopez
You’re talking to two ESL immigrants.
Kiki Monique
Okay, perfect. I’m gonna keep saying windy to you two.
Hoja Lopez
This is a safe space, for sure. This week, I would like to apologize to polite society. Because I did go into a restaurant with no shoes on, flanked by friends in order to hide the fact that I had absolutely lost my shoes.
Kiki Monique
You walked into a restaurant with no shoe?
Hoja Lopez
Oh, no shoes, no shoes at all, but was not caught, walked directly to a table. Sat, ate my full, very fancy meal. It was one of those very dimly lit sexy restaurants, you know?
Kiki Monique
Were you trying to like fight the no shirt, no shoes, no service rule?
Hoja Lopez
I’m a rule follower. I’m 100% of rule follower. I just literally did not have shoes because my friend accidentally put them on the trunk, like on top of the car. Didn’t tell me and then we drove away. And I thought they were inside of the car. So by the time that we actually get to the restaurant, I’m looking around for my damn shoes in this car. And Stacy’s like, oh, I put them on top of the trunk and told you and I was like, well, I didn’t hear it. And now my extremely nice Doc Martin sandals are gone to the
Kiki Monique
Oh, no, yeah, I wish I was there when the people who discovered shoes because you know, you always find like random shoes in the road. You’re like, how do these end up here? And now we know the origin story. And I love that.
Hoja Lopez
Yeah, so I’m sorry, polite society.
Mohanad Elshieky
This week, again, apologizing to someone I do not know, a stranger again. But to give you some context, I was gonna head to a stand-up comedy show. And I was late. So I took an Uber to get there. And I sat in the car and you know, they’re like, there was like music playing when I got in. And every song that played I was like, man, this is good stuff. You know, this is like, the songs that I like, you know, and it just kept going I was like, this guy gets it. Like this guy is like really understands my taste. And then out of nowhere, a recording of my stand-up comedy starts playing. And at this point, I’m like, terrified. I was like, am I being kidnapped by some mega fan?
Mohanad Elshieky 44:48
I was like, Oh my god, what’s happening here like, I mean, good. I guess I have fans that will, would like to take me away. But I literally was just just taking terrified and then I just said nothing and then I looked at my phone and it turns out the phone charger I’ve been using from the car is also an aux cord and it’s been my music playing this whole time in this stranger’s car and that’s why every song was great because it’s from my phone and this man is just I’m just riding with him and he’s like this psychopath got into my car and it was like, I am the DJ now.
CREDITS
I’M SORRY is a Lemonada Media Original. The show is produced by Alex McOwen, supervising producer is Kryssy Pease. Our executive producers are Stephanie Wittels Wachs and Jessica Cordova Kramer. Our mix is by Kat and theme music was composed by Xander Singh. If you like this show, please rate and review. And please don’t cancel us. You can find out more about our show at @LemonadaMedia on all social platforms, or follow us on Instagram at @imsorry_podcast. We’ll be back next week and until then be nice, play fair and always say I’m sorry. Thanks for listening!
