Is to kind of go through these terms because people hear them
left right center communist socialist.
But for some people I don't think they really understand
what they mean and I thought it might be a good idea to stick.
Hopefully we'll do more shows and then we can kind of go kind
of peel the layer of the onion so to speak right as then we can
have a deeper conversation about these things once everyone's on
the same page what what we mean when we say left right
socialist. Can I?
Ask you a question, yeah. Have you considered that you're
doing plain language? What do you mean?
What's up do? You know what that term means?
Kinda. I think so.
Really quickly. So since we talked last, I also
rebranded my business page like I don't know if you even follow
me there. Yeah, yeah, the the copywriting
one, right? So I used to just be Larson
Coppico, like my maiden name. And I was like, well, I got
married, changed my name, so I'm gonna change my business too.
And I specifically rebranded as the inclusive copywriter, right?
OK, so right. Yeah, I saw.
That, yeah, that's, you know, partially for branding.
I also have a background in sales, operating, marketing,
etcetera. But the thing that I'm actually
working on making myself an expert in, which I am an expert
in. But I'm not an expert
academically, according to the academics, which is a whole
other thing I could Yeah, it's another rabbit hole.
But it's this idea of. The the real definition of plain
language is speaking in a way that your audience can
understand, Of course, yeah. I agree action from and so one
thing that I came up to like hit up against when I was talking to
some academics about plain language is that they don't
identify that people who are working like on the front line,
like trying to educate the public are often more expert in
plain language. Because we've actually had to
sit down and do that. Take these complicated terms and
like explain them to someone who doesn't speak English as a first
language. Oh yeah, exactly.
Has no background in political sciences or philosophy or
whatever it is religion and science, like tech.
Like there's so many industries, economics, finance, where we use
all this really complicated jargon.
And So what? I basically like sell myself as
now. Is as a plain language expert,
which is relevant both in education, like government
communications, government communications, and in like
marketing and sales. And it's not just about English
either. Like, I won't go off on a
tangent on it, but I have friends who do like Farsi
translations and things like that, and sometimes they'll tell
me what the government has put out in Farsi.
If you directly translate it, it's full of like offensive
language. Oh no.
So it's odd, like like like chromophobic language.
And this whole idea of like plain language is something that
I'm really like. It's a special interest of mine.
Autistic. Yeah, that's cool.
This is another thing with politics, right?
Like one of my things like where I feel and I think a lot of
people feel this way and maybe can kind of direct this right.
I feel that the average person is very turned off by politics.
And and then this is one of was one of my first, like, bad taste
with politics. When I was in Grade 12, I went
to Kitsiliano High School and we had a visitor special guest, Kim
Campbell of the Conservative Party.
And we're we know we're actually kind of excited to see her and
we actually thought we would get some value out of this
conversation. She stood up and it was just
like blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And then she'll question, like, I honestly don't remember a
thing that she said. It was just like back in the
British, North American octave, this and that.
And but you know just just was just like and then kids you know
or graduate class were asking questions to a very direct
questions and she just kind of looked through them and then
blah. Blah, blah, blah blah and back
and then OK, next question and and it's just like thanks for
the the gobbly gook, right. They're arguably the worst for
it, but they all do it. They all do it, do it.
And I noticed, like the deputy, she's terrible at it, too.
They asked her. We're working with our partners.
No one asked about if you're working with your partners.
My thing about political language, the the George Orwell
quote, the one about political language, is designed to make
lies sound truthful and more respectful.
But the actual best part of the quote is the end bit, where he
says. And to give the appearance of
solidity to pure wind, right? Like they're just blowing hot
air. Oh yeah, And but that's the
difference between, you know, again, one being on both sides
of the border, right? And I've watched a lot of
American politics, right. So I was very fascinated by it,
you know, 'cause it's, it's more of a spectacle, right?
But the difference with the American politicians, generally
speaking, and the Canadians ones, the Americans politician
will take off the tie, roll up the sleeve.
They will do a town hall and they'll speak very plainly.
They will. They'll speak very plainly
because they want to. They want to be relatable.
They want it right. And and and maybe sometimes they
they simplify even more So like, you know, the famous George Bush
Read my lips, no new taxes. Very simple.
We're Canadian politicians. It's more like this word salad
of gobbly Duke but thing. About Harper, how he used to do
his speeches and he would just like, drone on, drone on.
Drone on, sound bite drone on. Drone on, Drone on.
Like, intentional about that. But then he'll he'll drop a
sound bite. That is the one thing he wants
reporters to write. So it's like intentional
garbage, a little gem, and then more garbage in my lifetime.
I'm saying I'm you can straight up my lifetime.
This is possibly the most dramatic time politically.
You know the whole you you know all the political scandals are
you can't there's too many to even count right.
Morning when I was having my coughing I almost broke my
tablet. We got we're going to have the
Choo Choo train back the. Choo Choo train.
The Choo Choo train did. You feel that I was interviewed
during the municipal election to talk about Ken SIM and I think
the best thing that I said. Because they asked me like, oh,
what do you think about Ken SIM getting elected, blah, blah,
blah. Because I was there at City News
on election night said I don't think he knows what he's getting
himself into. He has no clue what he's doing.
And like I'm a business owner, like I'm an entrepreneur, it's
not the same as politics or government.
And I think the one thing actually that like my little
tidbit that I think we should talk about today.
The difference between government and politicians and
governance, they They want to be celebrities.
They want to be fucking Batman. They don't want to get down and
like actually do the work. It's just want to be celebrity
mouthpieces. They're not.
To me, it's like, are you doing the work?
Are you actually engaging with people?
Are you working with your team? Are you in the office, like,
showing up to media events? Stop gunning beers.
On yachts, Yeah, the city's in bad shape.
And this is like, you know what I I like a good time less like
anyone else. But when you have the poverty,
you have the street life, you have random attacks, you got
business owners getting their windows kicked in.
Thinks he can like, like, I don't know who his, who he
thinks his demographic is, who elected him, right?
Like there were certain, let's say, stakeholder groups that
they targeted communities that they really targeted.
And that's, you know, certain like ethnic communities and
business communities. But their messaging now seems
very kind of like like libertarian dude bro, bizarre
like. And I think that's what it is
for people like, back to that, I think people, they'll hear these
terms, like from my background too, they'll hear something and
they attach what they think it is.
And that's where a lot of these arguments.
Packaged meaning you have these preconceived notions that you
know you've picked up and. One thing I really think about
is like trying to look at the world through new eyes.
Like trying to think about things in a way as though I
didn't know anything about it. Yes, you know.
Yeah, and and that's, But part of that is like an aspect of the
practice of plain language, trying to think if somebody
didn't know anything that I know, would they still
understand what I'm saying? And that's kind of like my thing
now is. And I honestly, I always did
this even when I worked in government.
And one of my biggest criticisms of government when I worked
there and I told them was that they themselves legislate, that
we use plain language. But they're not doing it.
Like look, look at any post from the the BCNDP or from David EB
or from Jagmeet Singh. I know who developed their
communication style. They call it.
Connect, contrast. What is it?
Connect, contrast. And then they have another
thing. But.
But basically they have this method they use right where they
say, oh, Canadians are struggling with housing, Justin
Trudeau is horrible, NDP is the only solution.
And I'm like, this is such tired, outdated sales, Yes.
Oh, totally. And because I, you know, I have
a sales background, I have a ear for anything salesy and and for
me it's like, 'cause now I try to do sales without doing sales,
if that makes sense. I call that Joy based selling.
I have a term for that too. Oh, that's awesome.
My whole thing in that though, is that you have to be honest,
yes in. Order to sell without being
salesy. And in order to be honest, you
can't use political language. You can't use misleading
language. You can't lie to or shame your
audience, yes. And that's really the problem.
Like, to me, what the NDP are doing or trying to do is they're
trying to use that outdated sales method of the emotional
roller coaster. You have this horrible problem.
Look how bad it is. We are the only solution.
We can you but. That is to me, the worst way.
Not only to sell, but to retain someone.
Yes, because you get buyer's remorse from that right.
Exactly how many people, especially like you're saying in
these kind of volatile times, more and more people are losing
their party loyalty, yes? I have like, are you affiliated
with any party? Like I'm confused.
This is for me, I'm the most. We have these like pre packaged
preconceived notions about these things and we just like.
Repeat things we've heard rather than think critically about what
we're thinking and saying, yeah, but let's just, like, actually
just go into like the the most simplest thing because we hear
this so much. Oh, he's left.
He's right. The first one is what's the
difference simply between left and right?
I don't like to think of it as like a binary.
Instead, I almost like to think of it like a spectrum or even.
Like a circle. Because if you've ever looked
into or you're aware of politics, you've probably heard
if you go far enough on the political spectrum, you fall out
the other end, right? I've heard that.
It's why? I started thinking of myself as
maybe a radical but not an extremist.
I think we need to make space for conversation and room for us
to come together and think more about how we're similar than how
we're different. And I honestly think that even
just the labels left and right are starting to become
incredibly problematic. Yeah, me too, because.
I often engage with people as someone who has always
identified with being on the left, right, I engage with
centrist. I engage with people who think
of themselves on the right. But.
To people on the left, to us means you don't care about
people, right? Like that's exception.
And I think that there's a lot of people who would identify
with being right wing, who do still care about their country,
their neighbors. And I think that that's where we
need to start breaking down these ideas because when we when
we other people that's how we end up in conflict.
Absolutely. I agree with that.
Like I'll give you an example like when I again going from
Canada and the United States, right.
So I I see myself probably like maybe certain issues are more
this way and this certain issue like I'm all over the map,
right. I believe at the end of the day
that people should have personal freedom to govern themselves.
Abortion, healthcare, those type of things.
Those are personal decisions that are none of my business.
That's why I look at it, right. But when it comes to taxation, I
think Canada has a very vicious taxation policy, which which I
feel that could be scaled back a bit, right?
When I went back and forth to the States, the thing that I
would see that was very different than Canada back in
the day was you would see extremely rich people and you'd
see extremely poor people. I saw like back, like even 10
years ago, I'd see like, poor families all living out of a van
in a Walmart parking lot. I think, Oh my God, that would
never happen in Canada. So I, I appreciated that we had
this social safety net that was more robust than they did in the
States because, man, you fall in the Crocs in the States, you
fall deep, right. And no one gives a, you know,
really more like. A like a cavernous pit than a
yes. Yes, but I think the problem is.
Is that in Canada that crack has been widening and even when we?
Have progressive governments like in BC, they have made some
improvements, but that crack has still been widening and the
problems are so big it's like we can't keep up with them at this
point. Like I think about you mentioned
housing and one of the projects that I worked on when I was
working for the BC government was a research project with SFU
on. Refugees and newcomers, right.
And youth in Burnaby specifically.
And one of the greatest issues is housing for that community
because they get put on a social housing list, right?
And they while they're on that list, they could have a family
of five or six or seven living in a single bedroom apartment,
but until a house with a bedroom for each child of a certain age
and gender. Becomes available.
They will not get housing. Oh my God.
So instead of giving them like taking them from that one
bedroom and putting them into like a three bedroom or
something, yeah, fully progress them up.
In there, Oh my God. And sometimes for so long that
the kids, like, are living on top of each other.
And again, we think about mental health, right?
Yes. Like, what is your quality of
life if you're a family of five living in a single bedroom home?
Wow. Right.
Like, and then I start to, we started to look at like, what
things can we do to kind of keep these kids out of trouble?
That was their attitude, which to me was already problematic.
It's like a white savior complex.
Yeah, kind of. Right.
The other thing that I found really interesting was that in
partnering with SFU in this project, and I'll be honest, I
don't know if they ever finished it cuz I left before they we
wrapped it up. In partnering with them, when I
was doing my research, I discovered that the University
of Victoria had already done a study on it, like the exact same
topic. And so instead of taking action
or using the information from that, it was a very recent
study. It had been done like a year
previous. Instead of using that, the
government and SFU decided to just do it again, like it made
no sense to me. I was like we already have the
data. We already know what could help
these kids. What could help these families.
Just want to research it more. Wow.
When when I was in startups, right, I did I did 12 high tech
startups some of them like incredibly well funded.
And what the method we use was a was a method called agile
development, right. You you plan and then you see
how it affects on the ground and then you kind of have to adjust
and then you do more plan. You know what I mean?
Like you do it in little in little segments where the
government. Can be so hesitant to take
action? Yeah.
Like if you look, have have you heard much about the modular
housing lately? I heard about it, but I don't
know much about it. No, I don't know much about it.
That's a big thing, right? When the the ND, like the BCNDP
came into power when I was still working for them, we built all
this modular housing, right? Right.
But has it solved anything?
No. Has it?
Helped. And why haven't they kept doing
it right? So like you're talking about
they finally did something, but I'm sure they have data on it.
What are they doing with that? Are they taking more action?
I don't see it like in my neighborhood.
I see more and more people becoming homeless.
Oh, hell yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I know it's scary.
So just for definitions of terms, it's what you this, like
going back to left and right in your opinion.
OK. Just like for the audience
listening, what typically when you say this person's right,
what words conjure up when you hear that, when you hear that
term, they're right ring? I'll be really honest with you.
Yeah, be honestly. As someone from the left,
fascism comes to mind. OK, that's something.
So then what does fascism mean? Let's go to that terminal,
because I hear that a lot. Oh, he's a fascist.
You're a fascist. A fascist.
And. And and my understanding of
fascism is when corporations and government come in this big
block and they decide things for you.
Is that I? Mean.
So like this is kind of the extreme end, right?
Of like authoritarian, totalitarian, fascist.
But to me, that's restricting like your rights and freedoms.
Is a big part of it. And prioritizing one group over
another, right? So those are kind of the
concepts that I would think about.
Personally, I don't think everyone who identifies as right
wing is a fascist. That is absolutely not true.
But I think the problem is that people on the left see it that
way, right? Just like everyone on the right.
Not everyone, but a lot of people think people on the left
are communists, right? OK, so.
Let's like, if you're looking at the extremes, that's kind of
what we have. But at the end of the day,
people who are on the right are more conservative than fascist,
right? Yes, yes.
But in conservativism, there are elements that are problematic,
yes. Because a conservative wants to,
like, preserve the way things are, let's say.
Like they believe in traditional values, maybe family values,
things like that. And you know, they don't want to
be taxed too much. They want, like to be able to
have free enterprise and capitalism and all those things.
But I think this is the problem, right?
Is that people on the left like vilify that attitude.
And the thing that I find most interesting was that when I was
on like in the NDP, like very in the left.
A lot of those people are young families.
They have family values. Some of them are Christian or,
you know, religious in some way. And I think that's really the
problem, is that we look at the right, like this extremist,
fascist, totalitarian, but really like, it's this idea of
like family values, of like preserving kind of like societal
morality. You can get into the nitty
gritty of it. But I think the real problem and
kind of what we're talking about today is.
Having these preconceived notions about these terms and
thinking they mean something that they really don't.
But I also think that when you identify with one of those
things, like I like I've said, I I identify with being on the
left. But do I identify with all of
the extremists on the left? No.
Do all the people who identify as right wing identify with
those extreme views? Probably not.
You know, I think we we kind of touched on this, but one of the
main issues to me when it comes to conservatives in Canada.
Is my right to choose as a woman right?
Like a right to do what I want with my body?
And the other term that I'd like to bring into the conversation
is cognitive dissonance? Yes.
Right. This is a major issue in our
society, in the world where people say they want one thing,
but then they do all of this mental gymnastics that convinces
them that what they're doing is working towards the thing that
they want, when in fact those things that they are doing or
thinking or believing are in complete contravention of what
they say they want when. People are emotional, right?
And I've done this. Oh God, I've been guilty of
this. You're emotional.
And and sometimes when you you get into that very reactionary
state you start throwing out terms and yelling and this and
that. Do you really know what you're
saying? Even myself, right.
You know what I mean? Because you're in that emotional
state, right? I, I, you know, we this could
maybe another show but we could talk about are there forces that
are pushing people into these types of emotional state these
what they call these divide and conquer type of tactics.
Right. You know the darker aspects of
the politics give it like an institution, right?
Like when we talk about institutional issues or systemic
issues, really what we're talking about is these
institutions of thought, right? These institutions of thought
are kind of like self feeding, right?
So, like, if you think of the NDP or the Conservative Party in
Canada, who started them, right? Right, That's good.
That's a good point. Are any of those people still
there? Yeah.
But we are still repeating things that we have heard and
have been saying just because that's what we say, right?
Right, right. Like that's.
Yeah. I think about a lot, too.
Like the world has changed. Yeah.
For a lot. And even like I I talked to you
about briefly before we started. Even like on the left, they're
using these really outdated, like shameful sales tactics in
politics where they're trying to make people feel bad.
And I I see that from every party.
And the thing that I think that we really need to deconstruct is
partisan politics. Like, to me, it almost looks
like a children's sports day, except for more violent and
rude, you know? Yeah, totally.
I don't understand why we have to identify with the political
party like it just seems silly team.
Sports, right? And you know, it's kind of funny
and I always think of this, right?
Like when you watch like World Cup soccer for example, right?
Doesn't matter if it Brazil or France or whatever.
And whoever teams wins a week later you see those shirts
everywhere. Everyone's putting on that shirt
because they want to feel like they're part of the winning
team. Like I remember when Brazil was
winning all the World Cup soccer then the every time I'd go out,
Oh my God, there's like a sea of Brazil shirts, right.
So I think it's like a way people they want to identify
with the winner, right. And made me think of something
and I was telling this to my partner because my partner's
from Ontario so he doesn't really understand how crazy BC
politics are. BC politics in itself, It could
be a. The show.
Right. And they're in the Liberal
Party. And I was telling her, well,
they're not liberal because she thought they were affiliated
with the, the federal Liberal Party.
There are. And she's like, why did they
call themselves the Liberal? I go, well, they used to be the
Social Credit and then they had all these scandals, a guy named
Bill Vanderzam, that's a whole nother story.
And then they rebranded as liberal and then people.
Especially the English second language.
Or just maybe moved here from another place.
So they think, oh, they think they're voting for the other
liberals, Right. So again, the definition of the
terminology, right. I think I heard.
I don't know, maybe you can tell me.
I heard they're gonna rebrand themselves as a united party or
something. Well, they've already done that.
Oh, they have. So they've already rebranded
themselves as BC United. This I think just happened about
a year ago in a way. I feel like that's a good, good
thing, but only because now people can understand that the
provincial party is not the same as the Yeah.
And if you think of it this way, the BC and DP even plays off of
the popularity that, like, Jack Laden had federally, right?
Yeah. Right.
Yeah. So.
Like, the one thing I have to explain to people constantly
when it comes to like, government or political issues
is that provincial parties and provincial governments are
completely separate from federal the BCNDP and the federal NDP or
the BC Green Party and the federal Green Party.
They might share a membership list, which is a whole other
problem. They share a membership list,
but they don't necessarily share all of the same policies, no?
Right. They share staff.
A lot of the same people are, you know, influencing or running
provincial and federal parties. And when it comes to campaigns
as well, they will take provincial staff and ship them
all across Canada. Every party does this right?
So a lot of the like, people in power or people with influence
are the same in the parties. But then you also have this
layer of the party, like the BCNDP is a good example.
Because we're here, the BCNDP and the BC government, who is
the NDP are not the same thing either.
The people who are in government are not necessarily beholden to
the demands of their party. Wow, right.
We can pass policy decisions at the party level.
And we've we've seen this with environmentalism in BC, right?
The BC. And DP as a party is much more
pro environmental than the BC government is, even though it's
the same people. Oh.
Wow. Right.
So yeah, that makes. Sense they become more centrist
because but isn't that? Confusing for the average Joe
out there, though, like, you know what I mean?
Because it's like a, oh, the Liberal Party.
Oh, you know, I let you know if they like, say they like Justin
Trudeau, right. And then they think they're
voting for the same team. So one big term I want to talk
to you about. So I remember, I think it was
about 2006, There was a guy named Ron Paul who was
Republican and he was seen as a libertarian.
And and he had a lot of support especially from because my
background is IT and and and the IT space loved him.
They absolutely loved him. He was a, you know he's kind of
a funny guy but you know and interesting and that was a very
popular thing, the libertarian and then even the United States
has a libertarian party. They never do really do
anything. But that was a popular thing
that was thrown out right. It doesn't really kind of
diminish since then. But like, for the audience, how
would you describe a libertarian?
Someone that identifies himself as a libertarian.
So a mean proportion of or component of libertarianism is
around personal freedom, right? Like, that's kind of like the
the overarching big idea of libertarianism is like limited
government intervention, like economics and social things,
like they believe in, like free market capitalism and things
like that. But the interesting thing is,
when you say libertarian to me, I think of the Green Party,
right? OK, so that's another conception
is that the Green Party is on the left, but it?
Wants us to again identify with the left.
Don't see the greens as on the left.
See, I never. Fight not A viable option for
those of us who want to vote progressively.
And you can even see this, like with their whole scandal of
leadership that happened federally, you can look into
that more. There's a lot of racism in the
Green Party. Well, you just taught.
Me, something where I I've always saw them as a lefty
party. Wow.
I didn't. I didn't.
Yeah. I didn't see them as
libertarian. Well, that's interesting.
Progressive environmentally. But they the big criticism that
we hear, especially in BC and you know, I've worked in
campaigns provincially and federally and it's the same
thing. A big thing we hear is that they
don't have the backs of working people.
Like they're lacking on social policy.
And I know especially in BC with Sonia first.
So now, like a lot of people like Sonia, like we don't see
them as a beacon of feminism, let's say either, right?
Right. So I think it's like those of us
on the left, especially a lot of us who have left the NDP, which
there's tons of us who have left the federal and the provincial
NDP. Interesting, we we will not go
to the Greens because we don't feel welcome there.
They can change some of their language.
But it's that like until your actions meet what you're saying,
like I'm not right. Yeah.
Well, there you go again, right, like for the average person,
right, They see green. Green has been very marketed,
you know, from a marketing background.
Oh, green is good. Green is about the environment.
Green is like everything we want the earth and hippie and
everyone's lives in a kumbaya life, right.
And and a lot of people and this is what they have noticed this
for any topic, any topic, most people will just take a a
surface layer of understanding about these topics and like you
said, they there there's a, you know that that analogy of the
iceberg, right? 10% floating above and then 90%
under the surface, right? So that's interesting.
I now, I'm going to do some more research into the Green Party
now and and I think again like this, this is coming a little
bit from like real things, but it's also a perception and I
think when you're in a political party, if you're thinking about
how to brand yourself, right, Yeah.
I think a lot about who are their intended, who is their
intended audience. And I think political parties
and governments sometimes maybe not so much government but
political parties make the mistake of thinking they're
speaking to everyone when in fact they are not like they
they're only speaking to people who are going to be their
engaged audience. But I always think like.
Who? Who is an engaged green
audience? Like who are the people they're
attracting if it's predominantly like old white people and a lot
of your young environmentalists who's tried to go there ended up
having to leave because they weren't respected, Like again,
look at the leadership issue in the federal Green Party.
They've got so much infighting and problems of their own.
It's do they have democratic processes even in their their
own party. And that's really a question for
every party because I personally have a lot of issues with the
federal and provincial NDP on that front as well.
Democracy is in their name, the new.
Democratic Party.