01. Dear Hank & John. 002 - It's a Humor Podcast! Part 1/5.

• [Introduction]

Hank: Hello and welcome to Dear Hank & John. John: Or as I prefer to think of it, Dear John & Hank. Hank: The podcast where we answer your questions, provide dubious advice, and give you all the week's news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon.

But first, John, give us a short poem because that's what you like to do. John: That's how we like to start the podcast.

Today's poem comes from Ogden Nash. It's called Everybody Tells Me Everything. “I find it very difficult to enthuse

Over the current news.

Just when you think that at least the outlook is so black that it can grow no blacker, it worsens,

And that is why I do not like the news, because there has never been an era when so many things were going so right for so many of the wrong persons.”

[Frederic Ogden Nash (August 19, 1902 – May 19, 1971)

American poet well known for his light verse.

A poem, Hank, that reminds us that the news exhausted and outraged us even before the men and women of cable began yelling at us and at each other.

• [Question 1]

John: And which also brings us to our first question of the day from Diana: "Where should I get my news?

Isn't everyone biased? Hank: So "Dear John and Hank, does objectivity exist?

basically. I like how we get to the root of the big questions that are basically ongoing philosophical questions that no-one has been able to answer for the last two thousand years. John: Yeah Hank.

That actually reminds me that we got to the heart of the podcast so quickly I forgot to mention our sponsor. You know, we're gonna have sponsors moving on, Hank. Are you aware of that? Hank: No, this has actually taken me completely by surprise.

John: OK, yeah.

No, we are going to have a sponsor. Our sponsor for this podcast and every podcast is us. Today's podcast is brought to you by John and Hank Green, co-owners of DFTBA Records, dftba.com, your friendly neighborhood e-tailer. Check it out. Hank: Dear Hank & John is also brought to you by the Orlando Solar Bears, a defunct International Hockey League from the 1990s. John: Dear Hank & John, which wouldn't be possible without the delicious, crisp, and clear taste of Crystal Pepsi. Hank: Dear Hank & John, brought to you by Rock'em Sock'em Robots. John: Who's gonna win, the blue robot or the red robot?

You won't know till you buy Rock'em Sock'em Robots, available now at rockemsockemrobots.com/hankandjohn. Use the offer code hankandjohn to get 15% off and ensure that we make $6 every time you buy Rock'em Sock'em Robots. Hank: I want to see if Rock'em Sock'em Robots actually still exist right now.

They do, they do. I feel like that, we shouldn't use that because, like, they're a real thing and we just advertised for an actual product. So don't... DFTBA... So Dear Hank & John is not brought to you by Rock'em Sock'em Robots. It's brought to you by the game Crossfire. You'll get caught up in the crossfire if you play Crossfire from Mattel. John: Dear John & Hank, brought to you by Chuck E. Cheese. Chuck E. Cheese, the number one place to go when your child is five and does not yet have an enterovirus. Hank: (Laughs)

John: I'm just kidding.

I actually love Chuck E. Cheese. It's true that I get... Hank: Chuck E. Cheese still exists?

John: Does Chuck E. Cheese still exist?

Hank, Chuck E. Cheese is, not only does Chuck E. Cheese still exist, I spend almost every Saturday there. Hank: Oh.

Meh. John: I love Chuck E. Cheese.

I might like Chuck E. Cheese more than Henry does. Um, can we get to, uh, the question... Hank: The question asking and answering part of the podcast?

Yeah.

Maybe we should do that. John: Yeah.

It was a question, uh... Hank: Objectivity.

Does it exist? Where do you get your news because there is no such thing as a non-biased source of anything that is human. John: I mean here's my answer to the question.

I try to get my news from multiple different sources. So I read The Economist, I read The New York Times, I read The Wall Street Journal. I also read the The Indianapolis Star, my local paper, and I read my Tumblr and Twitter and Facebook feeds which I try very hard to curate intelligently so that I'm hearing from Human Rights Watch and I'm hearing from the Gates Foundation and I'm hearing from organizations that are focused on what's called, like, effective altruism like trying to maximize the effectiveness of your charity dollar. So I want to hear from lots of different organizations, both news organizations and other kinds of organizations that are doing work around the world to find out what's going on. I also get a lot of information from Wikipedia which I feel like is a pretty, uh, pretty good collection of human knowledge. Not the best but good. Hank: It's pretty amazing that Wikipedia has managed to not be biased, uh, like it's manged to be fairly unbiased and that, I really don't understand how that happened and how it's possible but it does seem that way.

John: Well, it depends on the article.

Some of the articles, some of the articles are not great. But yeah. No, some how or another Wikipedia has become an astonishingly good encyclopedia. There's no such thing as a perfect encyclopedia, even, you know, even expert curated ones are not perfect, but it's a very, very good one. Hank: I think that if you're looking at things that seem like unbiased news, that you're getting a pretty good sort of cross-section of unbiased news, the trick is to not go to any one source.

And the other trick is to read the news rather than just read whatever comes across your Facebook page because that's where the most bias happens, when you're only sort of being exposed to the news that your friends want to share or that people in your, you know, in your world are sharing. If you're only seeing and having conversations inside of a bubble that is created by, you know, your internet preferences then the internet is creating a world for you that does nor reflect the actual world. John: Right.

You end up in an echo chamber surrounded only by voices that you already agree with instead of, yeah, being exposed to stories that you might otherwise not. I mean that's very difficult to do. That's one of the things I like about The Economist is they report news from all over the world. Now obviously they still have an American and European bias but there's quite a lot of reporting from around the world. • [Question 2]

John: Hank, I have another question for you.

It's from Silvia. "Dear John and Hank. What's the most unusual place you have ever peed? Hank: Oh, I feel like that question is kind of, because you pee everywhere you go, it's got, that question is kind of what's the most unusual place you've ever been?

So for me the answer is to that question is the White House where I also pooped. John: Oh, that's wonderful, Hank.

Congratulations. Um, the most unusual place I've ever peed is Mike DiTullio's bed. Hank: Poor Mike DiTullio.

Are you just gonna let that hang there? You're not gonna explain that at all? John: I don't know how to explain it.

I made a poor decision. Hank: (Laughs) I...

John: And Mike DiTullio's life was negatively impacted as a result.

Hank: I woke up in the middle of the night one time and, uh, puked in the sink of my bathroom, and this was, like, our childhood home.

And then I peed in the tub. And I mean you pee in the tub plenty as a person, like, that's sort of a thing that people do, but I just stood outside the tub and peed into the tub. And then I went back to sleep and then I woke up in the morning and I was like "I don't feel very well but I guess I'm going to go to school. I feel very tired." And I got into the bathroom and there was puke in the sink and pee in the bathtub and I was like "I should probably go back to bed. John: (Laughs) So there you go.

Hank has peed into a bathtub, I've peed into the bed of a relative stranger when I was an intoxicated college student. I do wish to clarify though that, just for the record, that the young man in question was not in the bed when I peed on the bed and I did switch mattresses with him and do all of his laundry. So in some ways I didn't pee on Mike DiTullio's bed, I peed on a bed that was about to become mine. • [Question 3]

Hank: Joe asks "Dear Hank and John.

Do you see yourselves making YouTube videos in ten or twenty years? John: Yes.

Hank: Yeah.

Kinda. I mean like, I don't know if there will be, if it will be YouTube videos. It will be web format video which is the phrase that I had used to me in a conference call last night. John: Oh, God, that makes me sick to my stomach, I'm so glad I don't have to get on conference calls like that.

Um, yeah, it will be video--I--I still think that we will make video, and I still think that it will be transmitted via the little tubes that make up the internet. Hank: Yeah.

People will watch them on their computer and iPad screens. Or personal device. John: I think that your personal device screen will, by then, be installed into your iris, so I don't think that you will be holding a screen, I think that it will just kind of run across you know, your cold, dead eyes.

Hank: It's funny the things we disagree on.

I think we will maybe eventually colonize the galaxy, and you think that in 10 years, we will have screens in our irisies. John: There's no way that we're ever going to colonize the galaxy.

That is so ludicrous I refuse to engage with you further in the conversation.