Summer Word Food: Pushback & Money

The Pushback Talks Summer Series is back!

This summer, Fredrik & Leilani are serving up what we call Word Food – bite-sized conversations that pack a punch. Here's how it works: each week, we randomly select two words and dive into a 10-15 minute exploration of how these seemingly simple words intersect with our complex socio-political moment.

Think of it as intellectual snacking with substance – light enough for your summer playlist, deep enough to make you think twice about the world around us. 

New episodes out every Wednesday, so make this your midweek ritual for curious minds.

This week: Pushback & Money

Transcript

Fredrik Gertten 0:03

I'm Fredrik Gertten and I'm the filmmaker.

Leilani Farha 0:06

And I'm Leilani Farha, and I'm the advocate.

Fredrik Gertten 0:08

And this is Pushback Talks Summer Special, where we play with words, me and Leilani, and we call it Word Food. Leilani, are you ready? I feel like I'm on a game show. You are. I'm ready. Let's go. And now I'm going to the word that is like on our minds all the time. Pushback. Pushback.

Leilani Farha 0:37

Nice. Well, why did we why did we name this podcast Pushback Talks? Um pushing back is what we are kind of all about. Figuring out ways to, and and we like interviewing people who are doing this too, figuring out ways to fight the inequalities that we are seeing everywhere, especially in our cities. And people are doing amazing things to claim their rights, claim space, to claim equality. They are pushing back. Things like uh taking to the streets. I love I mean, I really love a good protest, I have to say that. It's good for on so many levels. Um personally, it it ends up being good. You get to yell and scream and chant or dance and sing and all sorts of things. You meet cool people always. Quite often a good vibe with protests.

Fredrik Gertten 1:40

People, there are many smiles because I think it is very much about doing something together with others, you know? Yeah. Uh that it's easier to meet a complicated, cruel world when you do it together. You know, I I founded an initiative here in in Sweden called Doc Lounge, which is a documentary film club, but we do it in, we don't show it in cinema, so it's more in a club or environment where people also can have a glass of wine. And so I think to, for example, to watch a documentary, which are quite often about you know tough stuff, when you watch it together with other people, you don't get so depressed because you in some way you can feel the heartbeat of the person sitting close to you. You can you listen to the the breathing, or you can hear the the tears coming out, or you know, the emotions. And when you do that as a group, you feel much better. So then you are you are more ready to push back.

Leilani Farha 2:48

I agree with that.

Fredrik Gertten 2:49

I think another aspect of pushback is that when we focus so much on, I mean, uh and Trump especially is extremely good at grabbing the attention. He and his friend Netanyahu are extremely good at grabbing our attention and make us angry and sad and scared. I think it's important for us to also try to focus and look around and see people pushing back. And of course, it could be in many different ways, but I think we should always have on our mind people who are doing cool stuff and to be inspired by them and support people and say, wow, cool that you're doing this. And that could be a neighborhood initiative, it could be something very local, but I think it's it's something that gives people strength and you know, to make it easier to go about life.

Leilani Farha 3:50

Well, and in certainly in my work, it's so easy to just dwell in all the problems. But then when I start thinking about, and this is what you're saying, when I start thinking about all the pushing back people are doing, including myself and my organization, does make me think, wait a second, we have some power, we still have some power, even if we're being trampled on or other people are being trampled on. And when you engage in in the pushback, it's very rare that you're actually alone in it, right? Not just a street protest, but even if I if I pick up the phone to call a politician and say, I don't think you're doing your job and you're not representing my interests or the interests of this group of people. What I'll find is if I mention this to some friends or colleagues, they'll I did the same thing. I also called. Or they say, Oh, I'm gonna call. And so there's something really nice about the idea of pushing back, but it's never alone. It's always in good company. You're always in good company.

Fredrik Gertten 4:54

Yeah, and also I think also we should remember that what we see now on the global scale is some kind of backlash. I mean, uh Trump and his MAGA gang, the gangsters of MAGA, they are pushing back what we have been successful with. Women's rights, LGBTI rights, better understanding of um Native people's rights and Afro-Americans and Latinos in the US. I mean, globally overall, you know, we moved things a long way, and now they're pushing back. So we should also remember that they are attacking our success. You know, so it's also about seeing that we are actually protecting our what we've won, you know, and of course they want to kick us back. But I think overall, um within most people around the planet, everybody knows that climate change is happening. Everybody knows that women should have the same rights as as men. And most people are totally okay with trans people or gay people, you know. It's like it's come on. I mean, the kids love the trans people dancing, you know. Yeah, I mean, it's like it's you know, it's it's so silly. So uh remember that what we stand for is actually something totally fucking normal, you know. But to push back is also to stand up for what we think is normal, you know.

Leilani Farha 6:30

Absolutely.

Fredrik Gertten 6:31

So it's you don't need to be very radical to push back.

Leilani Farha 6:36

No, you know, and there's so I was just thinking there's so many ways to push back. Like I we've talked about street protests, but this this little podcast is a way that we are trying to push back. Or there's of course other things like litigation and there's calling your politicians or doing a media campaign or making a documentary or five. It's it's amazing. In fact, there are so many ways to protect what they're doing.

Fredrik Gertten 7:00

But I mean, my bottom line is that everybody can push back in in their own way. That's right. At work by being a decent person, you know, by standing up for other people's rights, you know. It's not that radical, it's just exactly just to be a good person, yeah. And it's in some ways it's easier because the enemies we have in our history are now so bluntly evil, so honestly evil, you know. They don't they're they don't feel any shame.

Leilani Farha 7:29

Yeah, but isn't that interesting that just being kind is a way of pushing back right now? Yeah, wow, yeah, that's kind of mind-blowing, Frederick.

Fredrik Gertten 7:40

But I I like it. So be kind and kiss your loved one, your kids, uh, hug your friends. Oh, you can kiss your friends too, and invite them to sit down with you and have a coffee and talk about life and talk about pushback talks. Tell them about pushback talks. That's our podcast. It's over to you.

Leilani Farha 8:08

I'm gonna send you a word. I have to think of one. Uh-oh. Um money.

Fredrik Gertten 8:15

Money, money, money. Make the rich man's world. Yeah, that's like ABBA.

Kirsten McRae 8:20

It is.

Fredrik Gertten 8:22

Money, it's a way, you know, it's a it's a practical way to exchange things with people. Um it's a smart way of solving things in some ways. But of course, it seems like money has been grabbed by some people. And and maybe it's always been, of course. The extremely wealthy has always been extremely wealthy and always lived very far away from the rest of us, so it's nothing new in that sense. But the love for money makes something with people, and it's interesting that a lot of people who become really rich they become rich because they they really want to become rich, they are so interested in money, so they don't, they would never go for an artistic career or something like that. Yeah. Something stupid. It would never become a human rights lawyer, you know. So it's it's almost like in some way a choice. Uh of course, not everybody can choose it. It's much easier if you already have money. So if you come from wealth, it's quite probable that you can stay wealthy. So it it is wealth, it's like it's kind of inherited. Most money is inherited. And in any in a country like Sweden, you can trace it back hundreds of years.

Leilani Farha 9:58

I can imagine.

Fredrik Gertten 9:59

To families who once got some land by the king because they they fought in a war somewhere, or you know, so it's like it's it's basically at one time stolen from people, you know. I mean, I go to Russia, the oligarchs, they they got rich because they stole wealth from the country, you know. And and Trump is he came from money. So I mean, you can see that a lot, but but also this like a love of money is very important, and then you can do whatever to get there.

Leilani Farha 10:34

And money seems to beget money. The more money you have, the more money you can get, the more money you have, the more money you can get. Yes, it goes on and on.

Fredrik Gertten 10:43

It's also this silliness of who has most, who's the richest person on the planet, who is the blah blah blah. And that's important for some people, it's important to be that one, you know. And they already have more money than they can spend forever, you know. So it's not about, oh, I need to buy a new yacht because they can already buy 10, you know. So it's it's a very silly game. And I think it's interesting when I meet super rich people, I find out that they don't read many books, they don't watch many films, they are not really interesting.

Leilani Farha 11:20

Right.

Fredrik Gertten 11:21

I mean, what would you think you would have an interesting conversation with Elon Musk?

Leilani Farha 11:26

Oh, God.

Fredrik Gertten 11:27

No, but I mean honestly.

Leilani Farha 11:28

Conversation. I don't even think he's capable of a conversation.

Fredrik Gertten 11:32

Well, I think that's because the idea is that I'm so smart, so I actually get so rich. But then the smartness in some ways like it's very shallow. It's very directed towards kind of how to make money. And they're of course they're really creative in this way of making money.

Leilani Farha 11:53

There are there are studies that show that people who have money think that they're better than other people simply because they have money. There's a famous uh research that was done, I think out of Harvard or one of those schools, um, using Monopoly, the game of Monopoly, and they gave, you know, a couple of people all the money, like a lot of money to start the game with. And then some of the players had no money. And then when the players with all the money won the game, they talked about themselves as having been so smart and strategic and like they were really like the best player when really they just had all the money, right?

Fredrik Gertten 12:35

Yeah, and that's interesting because it's even if you have all the money, you you still have to act, you still have to do something. You so you can get the feeling of that you're actually moving in the right way to make things happening for you. Yeah, and and so of course, they also struggle, but they have very poor abilities to understand how other people struggle, people who don't have any money at all. But of course, I mean, it's easy to agree that money has replaced God in many ways, and um, that is a problem. So we should make money less important. And of course, it's not a problem if somebody's done something amazing. Uh an artist made a hit that sells a lot of uh records, and yeah, I I'm not against people making money, you know, it's like it's that's not a thing. But we've talked about that in your friend uh Matsuccatu, you know, the Italian-American writer.

Leilani Farha 13:42

Mariana.

Fredrik Gertten 13:43

Mariana, yeah. She says that almost all successful companies on the planet who make money, they base their wealth on public funded research. You know, so it's exactly so. I mean, we can now see when when Trump is trying to take away funds to Harvard. So, okay, a lot of the success stories coming out of Harvard and then starting up to become big corporations, have all been funded by public money in the beginning. And that goes certainly for a country like Sweden or the UK or France or whatever. Yeah, the public money is more willing to take risks, yeah. And then, of course, then if you have loads of money, please share. You know, please share, pay your taxes, pay your taxes. And there is actually a movement now of millionaires and billionaires who want to pay taxes, and a salute to them.

Leilani Farha 14:42

Yeah. Speaking of money, I have to run to a meeting with one of the shifts, my organization's funders.

Fredrik Gertten 14:52

So money, money, money.

Leilani Farha 14:54

Money, money, money. And hey, how do we fund this podcast? We don't have any money. We can talk about that later.

Fredrik Gertten 15:01

We can talk about Leilani. I wish you uh tons of money to the shift and to your work because it's very important. So let's go, money, and see you soon. Bye, Frederick. Bye.

Leilani Farha 15:14

See ya. So if you like our podcast, you have to let us know. Please send us comments, rate us. I think that helps. Promote the podcast. Tell your friends about us. We need more listeners, and we need a little bit of love too. Love can come in the form of money. If you want to give us a little money every month, you can go to patreon.com, look for pushback talks. Every euro, every pound, every dollar buys Frederick a cortato. No, it helps us produce the podcast. Otherwise, we do it for free. See you. Bye.

Kirsten McRae 15:55

Bye. Pushback talks is produced by WG Film. To support the podcast, become a patron by going to patreon.com slash pushback talks. Follow us on social media at make underscore the shift and push underscore the film. Or check out our websites makeshift.org, pushthefilm.com, or breaking socialfilm.com.