 So, I debated doing a video about this because on one hand, I don't want people to think that I am purposefully trying to feed into leftist infighting for views and clicks. But on the other hand, if I don't talk about this, then it also kind of feels like I'm self-censoring for friends or for access to TYT's platform. So I mean, in the end, there really is no perfect way to handle this situation. But having said that, I do have a lot that I feel as if I need to get off my chest. And I just kind of feel like it's reached the point where I'm now compelled to talk about this, even if it is exhausting and feels like I'm beating a dead horse at this point. So in the event you are unfamiliar with what I'm talking about, here's a really quick rundown of all of the drama that transpired on Twitter. So when Cenk speaks against the far left, I listen. And that's what happened recently. When a well-known progressive stalwart, Anna Kasperian, a co-host of The Young Turks, tweeted, quote, I'm a woman. Please don't ever refer to me as a person with a uterus, birthing person, or person who menstruates. How do people not realize how degrading this is? You can support the transgender community without doing this. And the controversy has only continued to grow. To her credit, Kasperian didn't back down, tweeting this week, LOL, the meltdowns over wanting to be referred to as a woman rather than a birthing person is pretty wild. I'll never apologize for that, especially as a biological woman who's had a lifetime of being told I'm less than, I'm a woman, no apologies. And now the big boss, Uger, has jumped into the fray to defend Kasperian. So we'll come back to that clip in a moment because there's more from it that I want to watch, specifically an interview with Cenk Uger. But basically, Anna had a bad take and leftists reacted to it by trying to respectfully explain the issues with her tweet, myself included. The issue isn't necessarily that she doesn't like the word birthing person. It's that she's inadvertently feeding into this narrative that inclusionary language is an attempt by radical trans activists to erase women. This is what the right has been going on about for a very long time. And regardless if that was her intent or not, I mean there's a difference between intent and impact. And the impact that she had was what I was trying to get her to understand, right? So I genuinely don't believe that she intended to contribute to the rights anti-trans propaganda campaign, but she did. And furthermore, a leftist like myself pointed out that terms like this are really only used in very rare settings, clinical, legal or political settings. So why emphasize something so insignificant when the right is looking for reasons to portray trans people and their allies as unreasonable and overly sensorious? That was basically my point. And by coming out against these inclusionary terms, you kind of tee up this attack against any leftist who dares to politely explain why your take was indeed misguided. For example, I pushed back in what I thought was a respectful good faith way. And regardless of my attempt at a constructive conversation, do you want to know how the right portrayed that? Liberals melt down after far left journalist blasts birthing person language, the Young Turks host called the transinclusive language degrading. And can you guess who they cited in this article here? Yep, that would be me. Despite prefacing my response with quote, I respect you a lot. Fox News still used me as an example of liberal meltdown because that's what they do. First of all, Fox News, I'm not a liberal. And that is a term that I'm offended by when you refer to me that way. Second of all, the hallmark of any pitchfork mob is the mob before they bring you at the stake, telling you how much they respect you. But I mean, we know why they're doing this. This is exactly what they were always going to do, but they weren't alone. The Daily Mail did the exact same thing, citing myself and my co-host, Lance from the Serves, who also responded to Anna at that time. And I mean, I feel like all of us knew that this would happen. It seemed like Anna had unwittingly kind of like handed the right, this huge gift for no apparent reason. And I felt like this wasn't her intention. And there was this disconnect that I wanted to figure out where this was coming from, right? And explain to her why a lot of people found that troubling. So I reached out to Anna privately because I felt like if she just, if she heard me out and tuned out all of the noise on Twitter, she would understand where myself and most leftists are coming from. And I felt like I kind of got her to see my point because I shared a video that she did where she defended inclusionary language just like eight months ago, when Professor Chiara Bridges was talking to Josh Hawley. And he was lambasting her for using people with the capacity for pregnancy in lieu of women. And she even referenced that video that I shared with her on the show that day when this happened. But I understand the importance of inclusive language. I just don't like to be boiled down to a body part. So Mike Figueredo from the Humanist Report reminded me of a video we did a few years ago where we were defending someone who used the phrase people with the capacity for pregnancy in the context of the abortion debate. I believe it was. I'm totally fine with that. I think that's totally fine. If that's what they want to use in a medical setting, great. But for me, my personal preference is I don't like to be referred to even in the context of an abortion debate as a person with a uterus. Person with the capacity for pregnancy, that's great. That's all I'm saying. I think my track record on transgender issues is pretty clear. And I hope you understand that I have no disdain or hatred for the transgender community whatsoever. That's all. And look, I agree that her record speaks for itself. But that's what also really bothered me so much. She knows better, right? You don't have to use that specific term. But why make a mountain out of a molehill when trans people are facing an onslaught of attacks and the threat of genocide? Like, why emphasize this seemingly out of nowhere? Now, I feel like I probably should have tried to engage privately from the get-go. But I mean, on Twitter, you just, you see something, you respond. That's kind of how it goes. We all have brain rot because of Twitter. So I responded publicly, but still I tried to be as charitable as I possibly could be. But unfortunately, I probably added to the pile on. And that's why she still felt defensive. But I just, like, I wanted to make it clear that the pushback was coming from a place of love, which is why I reached out publicly and privately. And knowing that her intention was to never cause any harm. I just wanted to explain why what she did just wasn't a good take. Now, with that being said, I don't know if she actually understood why I shared that video with her. It wasn't to basically float people at the capacity for pregnancy as some sort of an alternative to birthing person. Like, I wanted her to hear a specific argument that she made about inclusive language because it's easy to be defensive when you have a bunch of people on Twitter coming at you. Like, you can kind of get your guard up that way. But if you hear what we're trying to say from yourself, I mean, there really is no better messenger than you. So here's what she said specifically in the video that I shared with her. But in terms of gender, identify differently as a male or non-binary. But they still have the biological capacity, the physical capacity to get pregnant. So that's why the language, the rhetoric is inclusive to include those people. It is not a big deal, but they make it a big deal. They manufacture it into a big deal because that's all Republicans are. That's all they have. This is all they do. Endless bad faith arguments meant to fear monger and direct hatred and fear toward other Americans. Typically powerless Americans. So I shared that video with her privately, not to try to hypocrisy burn her, but to hopefully get her to see that what she was saying right there is where we're all coming from right now. We're saying what she said back then. That was my goal of sharing that video with her, not to float an alternative term that was inclusive. Like, I wanted her to see that she made the same point that we're making. We need inclusive language, and it's not even used that frequently. So it just doesn't feel like this is the most important thing. I'm going to emphasize right now during an international crusade against trans people. So we talked about it also on the leftist mafia in a way that I felt was good faith and respectable, and really that was seemingly it. I hoped that Anna was able to tune out the bad faith actors and listen to good faith criticism from people like myself and longtime friends. And I was hopeful that Cenk would do the same since he also defended Anna Kasperian there after that kerfuffle. But it seemed like nothing we said actually resonated, which is fine. You can't force somebody to agree with you if they simply don't agree. But when you make the exact same argument as we're making currently, and you've been a longtime advocate for trans rights, you've got to understand where we're coming from. It's really frustrating, and it's more frustrating to see them doubled down after we tried so hard to reach out in a way that I thought was respectable. I think that David Dole made an excellent point about this on Twitter. He said something to the effect of they've been the subject of bad faith attacks for years, so it's easy to see why they're so defensive. I mean, myself and many other leftists who reached out. We've also been on the receiving end of a pile on and I can tell you it is not fun. So I get it. I understand the defensive posture that they're taking. But when your allies reach out in good faith, that's when you should at least contemplate whether or not you're in the wrong. But that didn't happen. I mean, it's not just a bunch of random Twitter randos, right? This was Emma Viglin, David Dole, myself. Like we tried our best to reach out and Anna seemingly out of nowhere attacked my co-host Ole with this two week old clip. And I shouldn't say attack, but meaning she brought this up in response to Ole as kind of like a gotcha in response to something that Ole said that was completely unrelated. But this is what Anna took issue with. I have to say it. Oh, my God, I have to say it. I like Anna, but I feel a little bit like this is the cuddle, the white lady hour. And you know why? And you know why I thought this even earlier, because before it is, the majority report put out a thing to and everybody else. And I was like, boy, everybody sure feels the need to trip over their fucking feet to come out to defend their getting cooked when all of the people get cooked all the time. Nobody fight. I have yet to watch a video of anybody defending me from getting fucking cooked. I've never seen it. I've never seen everybody come out. Now, when you already kind of feel like your backs against the wall, I understand why that clip might make you feel even more defensive. But Ole's point, regardless, was valid, defensive or not. I mean, we were all bending over backwards to be overly kind to Anna. Whereas if this were anyone else, we probably wouldn't have been as charitable. But because we're close with her and we respect her and she's a longtime advocate, you know, we try to reach out in good faith. And that was just one portion of a very long conversation where we talked about what's the best way to hold our allies accountable, especially when we all have very large platforms. But that interaction spurred Phase Two of this drama where Anna doubled down and Cenk really didn't take kindly to good faith criticism from his own allies. And it started with this subtweet, presumably about Ole and the rest of us who took issue with Anna's original tweet. He writes, left wing extremists help the right wing so much. 66 percent of this country is left wing, according to the polling on policy issues. They don't believe in defunding the police or being called Latinx or calling women birthing people or abolishing prisons. Anyone who claims they do is lying. Now, I'll get to the responses here in a minute, but he's kind of just talking past the criticism. None of us are bringing up public opinion polls and I don't base my policy positions on public opinion polls as a public figure if I happen to be on the wrong side of an issue with the American people, I try to use my platform to inform them. So like none of this really matters to me. First of all, Latinx, I don't know why he's bringing that up, because none of us are arguing for that. But like in terms of like defunding the police or getting medical professionals to use inclusive language, like I don't really care that that is unpopular. It's the right thing to do. So I'm going to base my policy positions on morality, not public opinion polls. And there are a number of people who responded trying to make the same point, basically. David Dole responded trying to explain how refusing to fight for unpopular things means we would never have anything. We wouldn't have gay marriage, for example. Latinx tried to explain it, respectively. Again, only for Cenk to claim that we called them fascists, which we did not. Lance did not. Nobody who is an ally who responded claimed that they were fascists or tried to cancel them. Benny, who is a trans activist who's literally part of TYT's network, tried to get Cenk to understand that inclusive language isn't actually that unpopular and it's necessary, but Cenk responded condescendingly, claiming that she's hurting her own cause by insisting on this type of language. And this was probably the worst response that I saw. And it came when Cenk responded to Emma, who went out of her way to be gracious, only to be met with this smug response. Quote, good news, we are on the right side, mission accomplished. Now let me talk to you in a patronizing way about all of your opinions I need to correct. And to be clear, none of us were trying to be patronizing, but again, I can see how this comes off if you have everyone, you know, talking to you about how you're wrong. Again, I understand as a public figure how easy it is to become defensive. But the point that we're all making is basically you've got to decenter yourself sometimes. You are not the main character here, okay? You were talking about something. You were talking about a community that you are not a part of. None of us are, but we're trying to explain to you how your actions here are unwittingly leading to this community being demonized by the right. I know that that's not your intention and since we know that that's not your intention and you respect trans people, this is why we're trying to reach out. Like we're not trying to be patronizing. And I don't think anyone came off as patronizing as well, although I can't put myself in Cenk's shoes. But it didn't stop there because on the show that night, they continued to harden their stance further, which is what I was afraid of, which is why I was trying so hard to be as respectful as possible. And Cenk punched left and he called out Lance from the Serps, who again, was nothing but kind. I'll name the name Lance from the Serps. He's on here all the time on the power panel, right? And he comes out and does this like video about how he's so correct and ha ha ha. Oh yeah, they're young Turks, ha ha. Correct? No Lance, you're not goddamn correct. Nobody elected you. The polling shows no one agrees with you. You're 12 buddies online. I don't care, okay? And say, yeah, I'm 100%, he's 99.95% correct. I'm going to correct him. No, no, no, no. So don't look, you want to say I don't agree with you? God bless. You want to say Cenk, you shouldn't say anything back, because you're being rude. Come on brother or sister, I don't know what you're doing. I just don't really care to like collaborate with any other leftist ever again at this point. No, that's where I'm at because they come on the show, they build a name for themselves, and then they build a bigger name for themselves, trashing us as if they don't know who we are. As if they haven't worked with us, they don't know what our actual political values are. So I just, I don't, Jake, I never want to talk about them again. I never want to address them again. It's a waste of time. There's important stuff going on in the country. Our personal drama with a bunch of leftists on Twitter doesn't matter. All right. Okay, first of all, we all acknowledge that there are more important issues going on, which is why overemphasizing, birthing person, which is a term that is rarely used, is a bad thing. Now, why imply that all of these critiques are bad faith and we're only now trying to criticize TYT to grow our audience as if we're comparable to Dave Rubin and Jimmy Dore? Like, I don't think that she's trying to imply that we're bad like them, but like we're not talking about random Twitter leftists online who are trying to cancel. You're talking about your friends, Emma Vicklin, David Dole, Lance, myself, Ole, if all of us who you know are telling you one thing and then you have all of the right, suddenly cheering you on and yasqueening you and retweeting you and telling you to keep up the good fight, maybe for a second just take that as evidence that you are the one being unreasonable and you are on the wrong side of this issue. And again, you don't have to agree with us here, but at least try to hear us out without getting overly defensive. But it's clear that they've tuned out the good faith criticism and at this point it seems like they're not even trying to understand where we're coming from and that's really frustrating because again, we can disagree on this. However, the reason why so many of us try to be kind is because when you are in this position where you kind of feel like the world's against you and you have to defend yourself when you shouldn't have to because you have a record that supposedly speaks for itself, you know what, it leads to you hardening your stance and falling down this rabbit hole even further and that can subconsciously alter your mentality, which is what I didn't want to happen. But I feel like it kind of did happen and they kind of went further down this rabbit hole inadvertently. Like I don't think any of this is intentional but it seems like that's what happened with this particular segment. Now, I'm gonna link to the full thing. We're gonna watch that, but before we watch that I'll show you this tweet that Anna Kasparian liked where someone talked about how the revolt against quote, trans think is growing which is transphobic, full stop. And now getting to this clip, so Riley Gaines who is the person who lost to Leah Thomas, she's made it her mission to demonize trans people and they talked about a bunch of activists at a particular university basically heckling her and she had to be like in a room because the activists wouldn't leave her alone and like we can't get the full context but that's really what you need to know. When it comes to Riley Gaines, I mean she just needs to keep grinding until she levels up and get good scrub. I don't know what else to tell you but she's made like her losing and being a sore loser her identity and she's now extrapolating that to demonize all trans people but trans people responded by defending themselves and criticizing her. So this is what TYT said about that and after you watch these clips kind of like mashed together you'll see or I'll explain rather why I think them hardening their stance has kind of led to them going further down this rabbit hole and this path that they're headed on. Her Twitter profile is also I think meant to be somewhat provocative, mentions that she's a spokeswoman with Independent Women's Forum and that there are only two sexes. Now Gaines was in fact accosted by trans rights activists after giving her speech and I wanna be clear, there were trans rights activists or people who disagreed with her in the room as she was doing her talk. And they were incredibly respectful even though they engaged in protest as well. I think they did it right. But what you're about to see is what I think is incredibly counterproductive for anyone who actually gives a damn about transgender rights in this country. Let's watch. Now it's worth noting that there were trans rights activists in the room as she was giving her talk and I wanna show you what I think the productive protest looks like. Let's watch. And so I went to this convention. It was in January, it was in San Antonio. And so I go to the convention obviously not in support because the award was immediately meeting with. So they're holding up signs the whole time showing their support for the transgender community. There was also a Q and A portion where there was disagreement. They exchanged their comments, their disagreement with one another. I think that's productive. But what happened outside of that room? What happened for the three hours following her talk? Not productive. I don't understand how anyone would think that this is gonna win over hearts and minds in any way. That protest got out of hand the minute it felt that it became physically unsafe, right? Do not lose the moral high ground. You had everything right until then, please. The thing that's frustrating about these situations is that these exchanges, if it's done appropriately without devolving into violence or intimidation, it could be productive, it could be persuasive. That's the way that you actually make progress. And I think the biggest mistake that trans rights activists make is just assuming that everyone already knows everything they need to know about transgender people and how they need to have their rights protected. But you gotta understand that for a lot of Americans, these are all new concepts. And so people, it takes time for them to learn these new things, to be accepting of new things. And I think this knee-jerk reaction of, you're just a transphobe, you're a terrible person, I'm too. No, I'm exhausted, it is not my job to educate you. Okay, well understand that if that's your mindset, then you're never gonna win, you're just not. And if you think that you're gonna win by intimidating and bullying people, that's also not gonna work. That actually turns a lot of people off. Yeah, look, if you're an activist or you're in this sphere in any way and you say, well, it's not my job to educate you. Well, no, okay, it's not, but then you gotta go home. So what I hoped would not happen has seemingly happened. It feels like all this drama is kind of getting to them and it's affecting them in a subconscious way. It feels like in that clip right there, they were kind of airing their own grievances against trans activists because they've seen now how unreasonable certain people can be with regard to this issue. So maybe they can kind of put themselves in Riley's shoes. Like that's kind of what it feels. And it further solidifies my belief that they're not listening, like they're talking past us. And maybe they feel as if we're talking past them, I'm trying to understand where they're coming from. But at the same time, they are definitely not understanding where we're coming from. And that clip rubbed me the wrong way because it kind of feels like they were speaking out of turn. I mean, two cis people don't get to tone police trans activists who are facing the threat of genocide. You don't get to tell them that the only appropriate form of protest is when you're sitting quietly in a room with a trans flag, when a bigot who's going on a nationwide tour advocating against your rights is right there. I mean, what do you think Stonewall was? Stonewall was a fucking riot. Do you think that queer people got to where we are today because we were polite and respectful? And we had to ask permission from straight people to protest or what was the appropriate form of protest? Do you think that we waited for public opinion polls to change before we asked for civil rights? Of course we didn't do that. We demanded equality even though everyone fucking hated us. And so that covered right there to me. It came off as, well, you know, maybe the trans activists are unreasonable here because I've seen it firsthand. And I just have to point out that this is speculation, right? I don't know why they said the thing that they said there. It's not the most problematic thing ever, but it just seems as if their perception is specifically changing as a result of this Twitter drama, which is what I tried to prevent and which is why many of us reached out to try to correct them before their opinion on trans issues got worse, right? We know how the right portrays overly vocal trans activists, which is why we all in good faith tried to say, hey, Bestie, this ain't it. Maybe try to do a little bit better. But they just, they tuned it all out. And again, for the 100th time, I get how it's so difficult to accept criticism, even if it's good faith coming from friends when you feel like you're being dog piled on. But the problem is like, there's no level of introspection at all and it just keeps getting worse. So getting back to that clip from News Nation, Cenk went on this centrist news network and he explained why the left-wing extremists are bad for the movement and he really didn't listen to anything we said, which again, it's so infuriating because it's like we're trying so fucking hard, man, but you just won't fucking listen. But here's what he said. Well, the problem with the progressive movement now is folks on social media, from time to time, completely misrepresented. Now, I wanna be clear, what I would call the extreme left, don't have bad intent. I think the right-wing has bad intent. I think it's arguable whether the corporate wings of both parties have bad intent. But the extreme left is not helping our situation. So when you've got two thirds of the country on your side, lean into winning issues. And by the way, trans rights is a winning issue. And we've defended trans rights probably longer than any show in American media history, okay? So now when we say something simple like, we're positive women wanna be called women and they don't wanna be called birthing people or people with uteruses. And by the way, some like Anna are actually offended by that. You're not being inclusive, you're being exclusive and you're choosing to fight on losing ground for no reason. We have all the winning ground in the world. So, and Dan, the other problem here is the right-wing, when you have someone that agrees with them a little bit like Chris Rock will take big potshots at Republican white males, et cetera. But then he'll agree a little bit on cancer culture. And the right-wing will say, that's it, Chris Rock's one of us, right? On the left-wing, we have the exact opposite situation where somebody could fight for you for 200 years in a row. The minute they don't agree with the most extreme thing you've ever said, that's it, we're cutting them off their right-wings, their fascist, their transphobes, et cetera. We gotta win elections so we can protect the LGBTQ community and all of us. Cenk, my brother in Christ, if we thought that you were fascist and we wanted to cancel you, do you think that we would have engaged in the first place? Like again, I understand that you've been doing this for a very long time and you feel as if you are owed the benefit of the doubt more than what you're receiving. I'm sorry if you feel attacked. Like, I've got respect for you. I've watched UIT for more than 10 years. I've been on the network myself for six years. But with all due respect, you are wrong here. And I get that you don't like to back down. And you said this, like I'm not somebody who backs down. But that's not something to be proud of. That's a flaw. That's you letting your ego get in the way of good faith criticism from your friends. You're trying to portray everyone who disagreed with you as extreme when our basic fucking point at the beginning of all of this was birthing person is a term specifically used in very rare circumstances as an objective technical identifier. It's a non-issue. So all we're saying is you should know that your emphasis on this lends credence to the rights claim that trans activists are unreasonable and they're trying to erase women and tone police everyone. We're simply asking you to do better and for two seconds understand that you are unwittingly helping the right in their propaganda campaign against trans people. By coming at you in this way, I'm not trying to attack you. It comes from a place of love and respect. Again, I wouldn't engage if I had no respect but because I respect you and know your position that's why we're all engaging. And sometimes you get a little bit heated but understand it all comes from a place of love. Sometimes our friends need to tell us that what we're saying is bullshit and that's what gets through to them but you're not listening. And at the end of the day, what I want to emphasize here is that we have to pick and choose our battles and dying on this hill is just dumb. And when it comes to Cenk refusing to budge, understand that he was also in my position currently because last year I did a video where I talked about Wolfpack, right? And Wolfpack activists felt as if I misrepresented the organization because of a specific article that I cited. Cenk reached out to me and he was very polite and he said, Mike, Wolfpack activists think that you kind of messed up here. Maybe you can bring on someone from Wolfpack to talk about this and correct the record. And of course, I was a little bit defensive. I was like, what? How did what I say offend them when I feel like I'm pretty educated on this issue and my history of support for Wolfpack should speak for itself? I was defensive, but ultimately, do you want to know what I did? I put my ego aside and I ate shit and I brought on somebody from Wolfpack to talk about why I was wrong. Because sometimes you've got to put aside your ego for the greater good of the movement. And that's all that I'm asking Cenk to do here. That's all of us are asking Cenk to do in this particular moment. But with that being said, I still don't want to cancel Cenk or Anna. I just think that once in a while as political commentators with really large platforms, we have to take the L, we have to humble ourselves and again, acknowledge that we're not main characters here. We're trying to be advocates for a movement and sometimes maybe we don't represent the movement in the best way. All we do is correct and do the best that we can and try to do better. Even if you don't agree with us at a minimum, all that I ask is that you realize that our criticism came from a place of love. It was good faith. Ultimately, we're just trying to get you to do better because we know that you're capable of doing better. And I think that there does need to be a conversation that happens offline between all of us where we kind of just talk this out and explain to each other where we're coming from. Because again, as I said, we're kind of just talking past each other at this point and public discourse isn't necessarily going to get us to see each other's positions at this point. But again, I understand the defense of posture. I get it, we're all human beings. I've had to eat shit myself. As I said, it comes with a job and it's a necessity for anyone who genuinely wants to make the world a better place. And I believe that Cenk and Anna both want to make the world a better place. I believe that they both care deeply about trans people. But sometimes we get in our own heads and we become incapable of the centering ourselves and listening when that's what we desperately need to do. So it's not about agreeing on 100% of the issues or being overly pure or trying to cancel people. It's about holding each other accountable when we inadvertently cause harm to the movements that we purport to support. And we're only human beings. Sometimes emotions is going to cloud our judgment even if we try to be as logical as we possibly can. But when we have giant platforms, if there's so much at stake, we can't allow our egos to do that. And we have to put that aside for the greater good. So I don't know what else to say about this. I'm sure that we'll talk about this more on the leftist mafia, but that's what I needed to get off my chest. I just feel like I don't want to be perceived as somebody who's trying to cancel them. I don't want to come off as like an attacker who's trying to pile on. I just respect them. And because I respect them, it's inconceivable to me that they would be on the wrong side of this issue and I want them to be on the right side of this issue or at least see our issue, my issue with their take here in particular, but there's nothing left to be said at least from my perspective here. So the best thing that we can do is try to listen to each other and just move on and not give the right a dub here that they don't deserve.