181 Ill Have A Number 6

Good morning, Brian. How are you on this wonderful Friday morning when we record this? It's cold and wet, but I love it. It's a happy fall. We have two days of fall and then it's winter. No, no, you know, it's great seasons here, long seasons. But I'm doing for it. So we're going to talk about some stuff we've seen in the news today. One authority real quick, in case you want, yeah, fast food. Okay, really quick, that's your topic.

But Brian Marren, folks, has got me on this incredible diet and workout regime and everything else, and I'm feeling strong. I'm looking good. I'm going to soon get slapped on the ass by Brian at our next training event because he's so proud of where I've gone. But Wednesday, I lost my mind, and I told the wife, I said, "I have to have fat grams. I have fast food."

Normally, you know, there's only a couple of places in town that anybody goes, and I don't go to town often. But I went to this place, and I know it's probably upside down, backwards, Gunnison Pizza Company. Gunnison Pizza Company, remarkably, gunnisonpizzacompany.com. I tell everybody, not just people that are in Gunnison, I'll tell everybody, "Take a look." Brian, went into the place, greeted, clean, happy. And look, I got other choices in town. They had a 20-inch pizza. Oh, there you go, right there. Just rolled it like I do and took the whole damn thing. It was fresh, it was happy, it was everything that I wanted. Put me in the food coma. Well, and I promised them because they were going to call the police because I didn't want to leave. I promise I might do a promo if they didn't turn me in.

Perfect. Well, that's actually, it's a perfect start to the podcast today, talking about, I'd love to try that the next time I'm in Gunny by the way. But, you know, right into the topic of what we're discussing today and what we've seen is, you know, a lot of articles coming out and a lot of sort of different news stories about things escalating, tensions at fast food places. Right? So everything from the Jack in the Box one you sent where the guy got pissed about his fry order or something like that, and this time it wasn't the customer with a gun. It was the guy working there pulls out a gun and says, "Oh yeah, [expletive]," and starts shooting up, shooting back at, shooting at this person.

Then you have other ones where we've seen, you know, people getting so upset, you know, they blow up at their McDonald's, and they shoot the place up, or shoot at the people working there, or pull a gun. Police called. And some of these aren't even at the typical times when you see that late at night, you know, 2:00 AM, when everyone's been out partying and they want to get some fast food, and then some rival gang member or someone they got a beef shows up. So, you know, we're seeing sort of this rise, and literally just sometimes in the middle of the day.

Now, I said there's a rise in it. There's a, I would say there's a rise in news stories about this because, like I said, when we talk about when someone says, "Oh, you know, this is out of control, this is a big problem," I'm always like, "Okay, well, show me the data. Show me the numbers. Show me something that proves that." Because maybe you're just now hearing about something that's been going on for quite some time. And so, I would say that especially about the fast food stuff where people go, "Oh my God, look at what's happening." I was like, "Well, look, we have social media. We have a, you know, the speed of information is so fast now, your awareness of things that are going on is a much, much higher level." But ask any cop from any metropolitan area, and 30 years ago, I'd be like, "Ah, let me tell you about another one at the Denny's or at the McDonald's." Like, this stuff happens all the time. So first of all, I'd like to start before we get to like, you know, why does this increase or what's going on or how to, you know, why do those locations, Greg? Why, you know, why does that happen there? You get what I'm saying? I think kind of start there.

No, no, I love that. And let me, let me first dovetail on your comments because I think they're spot on. I feel that COVID impacted us in ways we're just beginning to understand. But also throw COVID under the bus and say everything, you know what, Brian? We're still reeling from the effects of World War II.

And I'll tell you the aluminum industry.

Okay, so first of all, you can't just point at everything and everything. Say, you know, with that background on that speech. Holy Moses, that was serious. You can't, well, and apparently that was a new thing, but even though every president gives a speech like that. But anyway, the thing we're talking about is, is sort of, it's not a causal relationship. It can be a cause, but it's not the proximate cause of, contributing factor to it. A contributing factor, a cause, those are all good suspicious, yes, but it's not everything.

So the next thing that you touched on that I think is spot on, is that there isn't a trend to these locations. Okay? These locations have been dangerous since they were founded. Pompeii, do you get what I'm trying to say, had a drive-by shouting at their food joint. Right? And what we have to do is, we have to look at that for just a second in perspective. So I can tell you about Woodward in Detroit in the '70s. Okay? Because I know, because my dad took me down there, and everything I needed to know, my dad taught me on Woodward Avenue between Eight Mile and Ten Mile. Do you get what I'm saying? Now, Woodward from nine and a half north of that, started getting in a place like Bloomfield Hills and Birmingham and stuff. Yeah, it was really nice.

And nice, really nice fast food places. And there was music playing.

Change it. It changes quick too. And you get what I'm trying to say. You saw there too because not only do you have that same experience from Chicago and LA and San Diego, but you've also traveled widely, and you see how that happens. So I'm telling something that nobody wants to hear, but socioeconomic factors contribute largely to where people loiter, and where people loiter increases the likelihood that there's going to be danger at those locations. That's simple. That's an algorithm. You can quote me on that. Right?

So if you have any idea economy, political upheaval, apocalyptic dangers on the news, you know, "Oh my God, Trump is coming back! Oh my God, Biden is here!" People turn that into these, these massive things every day. So what are you going to get? You're going to get a jump in fast food sales because I feel like [expletive], and I want to drown my sorrow in fat grams. I did it Wednesday, folks, at Gunnison Pizza Company. There's also a jump in alcohol sales, you know that. Where you drink the alcohol may change. Yeah, okay. But companies like that one when we were in Denver that Bearcat, or whatever that company was, remember where you could order it online even during the COVID, and they would deliver it. Yeah, Drizly, whatever that thing was, they made millions. Okay?

Then you get a jump in cigarette sales. Why? Because look, if I don't know what tomorrow brings, you think I'm worried about throat cancer? Yeah, okay. So, so all of those things that we use to help define this apocalyptic overwhelming nature, they're all offered at a convenience store. So the convenience store parking lot is going to increase in danger. They're offered at the drive-through of the local fast food joint that's parked where? Right across from the convenience store, and down the street at the liquor store. Or your convenience store might also be a liquor store, or your gas station parking lot that shares with the fast food. Are you seeing the trend?

Yeah.

Geographically, Brian, I could go to your town and circle for you the places that would have the highest propensity for this type of spontaneous violence. This isn't planned terror attack, right? It's, "What did you say?" Do you get what I'm trying to say here? "Your door is a little close. Hey, you didn't park right. Hey, kiss my ass. I have a gun."

Right. In all of those places too, I mean, like you just said, where, where are they located? They don't put fast food restaurants where it's hard to find. They put it as close to a major intersection or right off a freeway because they have to, it makes sense. Right? I want to get quick in and quick out. But quick in and quick out means that I'm also going to have to endure a motel with shady standards. I'm also going to have to endure a cash-only liquor store that does service out the back. Why? Because the same type of people that spend their money there might want to get away in a hurry.

And you're going, "Yeah, but I frequent that. That's the only one I have in my neighborhood." That doesn't mean anything. That's fine, and you deserve to be safe there, just like somebody in Bloomfield Hills deserves to. Yeah, what we're saying though, is that you have to turn on your SA (situational awareness) when you're in those areas. You and I, you and I were headed to a restaurant. I won't say the town, I won't say the place, I won't say anything else. And we are right down in the heart of the business district. You parked back in the sled combat park. We looked around, drove around the block, did everything we always do. And when we got out, the sled next to us was occupied. Okay? We didn't, we didn't have much of a choice where we parked. And somebody in that sled made a comment about not having enough room to get out.

A couple things were happening. First of all, they were going nowhere instead of smoking their kind bud, and they were planning on camping there. Right? Second thing was, Brian, do you remember how they were parked?

Yeah, they were parked on the line, separates. They were taking up two different parkings.

We were the one having a hard time getting out because of how they parked. So Brian used simple logic and said, "Yeah, if you take a look, you guys are kind of over the line," and then we walked off. Everything was fine. Brian, a block away from that, that would have been a death sentence. A block away from that, there would have been a gun fight. See, what we don't understand sometime is when everybody feels as though they're in a pressure cooker, whether the president is fair, okay, when you feel like you're in there, you feel like you have to have your say because we're humans, and we think that we want our say, not necessarily our way. But guess what? That say to me might be that trigger moment, no pun intended, that pushes me over the limit. You know, and now I go up there and you say fast food. Number one, it ain't fast because I'm waiting in line. Now you hand me the bag and it feels mighty light, and all the other food that I've had, and the prices have gone up, and I look in and there's 23 french fries instead of 35 or whatever your argument is. You see how quickly that can escalate? I don't think people look at that part of the equation.

No, and it often has nothing to do with, you know, the food order or what's going on. It's like you just said, you know, like we said, when COVID first started, "Hey, what are we going to see an increase in crime, an increase in domestic violence, an increase in homicide, an increase?" Well, why? Well, when you disrupt the system in such a drastic manner, in such it so quickly, right? If I have a lack, like you said, if I have a lack of critical thinking ability, I'm right here in the moment right now. I'm not going to make good choices. Holy [expletive], you just interrupted my whole life. I'm right back in my limbic system and survival mode, going like, "All right, what's going to happen next?" Right? And if I can't think through those problems, it's just going to be all reactive. So now, absolutely, I'm pissed off because of whatever reason, and prices are going up, and whatever, my girlfriend just broke up with me, and then this happened, and then now I can't get a job, and I got a court case pending, and I got this over my head. And now I go to the flipping McDonald's and I can't get, I can't get what I ordered. I don't feel like I'm getting what I paid for. Instead, I don't have the ability to go, "Hey, man, like, can you hook it up with some more fries?" Or, "Hey, what's the deal here?" Or just eat my food, or get another order because I don't have the money. Right? It's, it's, "No, now you, now I'm going to take it out on you, Greg, because you're the one that rang me up."

And it's happened so much, it's happened so much that now the people ringing everyone up, the people working there are coming in armed because they're carrying guns because they're scared, because they understand the problem, because they see it every day getting yelled at.

I mean, so let's yellow pad that. Let's, because you just came up with a, a fitting algorithm. Folks, take a consolation of the, the cues that Brian just had and put them on your outer ring. Now, jump to something like increase in people at these geographic locations. Increasing people means more likelihood that a dangerous event is going to occur. Okay? Just like you're more at risk in a soccer stadium during the game, do you get what I'm saying, than you are in your living room? Okay? So simple logic. Okay?

Part two, many more hand-to-hand cash transit transactions taking place, not only in the store, at the drive-through, but in the parking lot for other events that are going on. Now, we always talk about like nail clinics and salons and why they're higher on the list. So that's, that's a plus, that's a plus on your yellow pad. The parking lot's full, which means more close interactions with vehicles, more people trying to lounge, open their doors, park. That leads to anxiety, Brian. And then you have closer encounters coming in, coming out. "Hey, you're not wearing a mask," or, "You are wearing a mask." Right? The timeline, it matters. But the idea is that you've got to think about, you put people in there, and now you've got increased tension. Now you've got somebody that's spouting off, or you've got somebody that wants a fight, or you've got somebody that's there that's angry. All you, you are is fuel waiting for that match. And when it occurs, it's going to go so rapidly through the crowd that you're not going to, Atlanta, three fast food shootings, two of which with automatic weapons, and just over a 24-hour period. California, up to seven 911 calls at fast food restaurants a week for individual fast food restaurants. Brian, 77,000 dangerous incidents in their parking lot. Those are, those are things that we should pay attention to. And it's not the end of the world, but what do we always call? We say, "Well, there's a lawless spirit in the streets." You see how that goes, though? Yeah. You see, okay, your very first point was that we can use statistics to demonstrate whatever we want to, and the wrong people are pointing to those and saying, "This is the exact reason they happen now." It's escalating little bitty things that happen that create that environment.

Well, and we, we have to, you know, and like I said, this is, this goes into even what we discuss about, you know, how we measure and assess issues. And, and this is one of those where we go, "Well, it's policing," or, "It's this lack of," like you said, "Well, everyone thinks they can just do whatever they want." It's like, "No, like, we just got out of a pandemic. We're still in it, you know? That's still going on. People don't realize the effects that. And also there's rising inflation, which means those everyday prices at McDonald's are going up. So if I don't already am having a hard enough time buying food, and that's why I got to go to the dollar menu on McDonald's because that's what I can afford, well, you're just, you're literally taking food out of my mouth." So I mean, but the lower you are on the socioeconomic spectrum, the harder you get hit.

That, that's how.

And the closer you are to the violence, exactly, because you live in that neighborhood.

So, so I, I had a great argument. It wasn't a good argument because I, I had one before starting the argument, but the other person insisted. And they're talking about, "Hey, these uneducated people that work at these fast food places." First of all, if you need a job and you don't have a college degree, where do we all start, Brian? Every one of us started. So I work at a liquor store, do you get what I'm trying to say?

Making sandwich or something else.

Yeah, so I resent that. Second of all, yeah, it's clear that these places try to get the best employee for the least wages. And it's also true that when you have less training or less intellectual level, that your critical thinking skills will go violent before they'll go negotiating. Okay? So add those to your equation. Right? But you can't come and tell me, "Well, it's because those people don't get an education." Listen, this is where DEI works because let's be transparent about this. They don't have the same opportunities that you did. No. Okay? So don't, don't sit there and have that again Panacea covering all of these things. But listen, it's a factor. You have to consider if the person that you're discussing doesn't have the same mental acumen, and you're sitting there berating that person or bullying that person or talking [expletive], you get what I'm trying to say, they're going to punch you in the ear. They're going to come over the mouth. Are they? Okay? Why? Because they're going to get to that point and they're going to go, "Hey, point of no return. Now you're talking about me." And it's going to be a slapfest. And we've seen that a thousand times, and people don't just shut their mouth. And just because you're a concealed carry doesn't give you some authorization, do you get what I'm saying, to be a bad guy? The idea is that look, some bad guys have a gun, and the gun becomes an extension of their [expletive], and it's one of the four F's, and we have to go out there and wave our penises around. Okay? So that's a bad thing. But it's not everybody. But why do those news articles come to the top, Brian? Because they're the most exciting. Guy with AK, you get what I'm saying, shoot somebody over fish sandwich. That's got to be the lead because everybody will look at that. Now, is that the trend that we're seeing? Clearly not. But the idea is if you're too stupid to understand that if you're locked in a movie theater with a bunch of other people and somebody pulls out a gun, or if you're in a drive-through and the person in front of you decides to be in a gun battle with a former gang member that goes, "Hey, that's Jimmy." Right? Those are things that we can control. You see what I mean? We might not be able to control the other things, but you certainly can control that.

Yeah. And remember what the judge told you about waving your penis in, in public.

Yeah, but he was wrong, Brian. You get what I'm saying? Tim, the counselors, my probation officer, they don't know what the community, society, the mayor, the judge. All wrong, Brian.

So, no, but, but that's the thing is like you, you know, you're talking about, it's so funny. We, we often don't get a choice in the matter of those situations, right? And, and this is why it goes into, you know, like how we approach everything is, man, like, I, I want everything to go fine. Like I want to de-escalate any situation I possibly can. And that, that, that's literally going to that fast food or that restaurant place. Like I get frustrated, like going to some places where it's like, all right, we're going to, I'm going to take my wife out and we want to go somewhere nice, but COVID [expletive] everything up. Another restaurant industry [expletive], and like people have not figured this out. And so like now you do everything yourself and then, then you order and then before you go, and they're still charging you more. You pay. Yeah, they, they now there's a tip. I'm like, "Wait, what am I tipping? I haven't gotten anything yet." And then what is a, what is a kitchen charge? "Oh, it's to help pay our work." Like, "Hey, [expletive], if you have to put a 10% thing on the bill, just raise the price of your food by 10%." Like, you, you, like, like I, when I send someone from Brian, everybody, when I send someone a cost estimate for our work, right, I go, "Well, it's this, but also, you know, then there's a tax on that and there's this fee and there's, oh, there's the Brian and Greg charge because we're going to show up as well." What are you talking about? I go, "Just work it out so it's already, it's already a mess when people doing that stuff."

But the idea is, and they're not handling well a lot of these situations. And then people who don't want it, people who expected to go to a restaurant and get served, which is a normal expectation, are now doing things by themselves. Like it doesn't go well. And so like you just said, that this is why those locations and this is why those things happen. So, you know, just like you can, like, just like an insurance underwriter would look at an Actuarial Table of all the different variables, right? When they're underwriting your insurance policy, it's, "Okay, how old are you? If you're 16, wow, it's going to cost a little bit more. If you're 60,"

Exactly.

"or you have multiple accidents, that's going to cost more. Oh, you drive a certain type of vehicle that's kind of unsafe, so if there is an accident, that's going to cost more money." It's the same thing that you're talking about. It's, "Okay, so you're at the fast food restaurant. Well, what time of day is it? Well, if it's later, it's more likely for this to happen. You're exactly going on in that neighborhood. Okay, now you're increasing your chances. Oh, what's happening right there in the news and with the economy? That anger." Like, it's a constantly fluctuating percentage or likelihood scale.

And it's also, it's also a Mobius Loop. So I'll give you the example back to the '70s in Woodward Avenue. Why did it become a problem? I remember in East Detroit the very first McDonald's opening up. My dad drove my brother and I up there. My brother Brian was, is still at boarding school or prison or whatever you want to call it, Boys Town. And my, my dad took our work truck, his Sears Roebuck work truck. We went up there and he only had enough money with Mr. Owens, our next door neighbor, to buy us hot chocolate. And we all shared the hot chocolate, right? That was like 35 cents for hot chocolate, but it was in the '70s. It was near Christmas. Santa came in on a Hilo. They dropped him down on a rope ladder. It was the biggest thing in the world. We all cheered, the whole thing. Yeah, it turned out, I remember a couple years later, Taco Bell came into East Detroit. Those were the only fast food restaurants in the '70s. Blown up. Yeah, yeah.

So now you look at Woodward. So Woodward had those two and an A&W and whatever the other Arby's, America's roast beef, yes, sir. And all that stuff. So we were in Detroit. So everybody in Detroit had a car and guess what they did? They cruised Woodward. They cruised Woodward because of the new fast food joints and you could pull into the parking lot and they were hanging out.

Waitresses, exactly.

So where do you think crime would move to? So what happened is community said, "Hey, I'm more of a police presence because I don't want cruising because I got to get home at night, and it's challenging that, and it's increasing the garbage on the streets, and it's increasing the noise volume." So the cops started cracking down and making traffic stops and they figured out that, "Wow, there's a lot of bad things in cars on the way to these locations." Yeah, and now they have, the Mobius Loop went to, one of the guys shot back and then the next thing is don't make traffic stops for a small violation. You see how everything goes that circle, Brian? A community can't have it both ways, though. What you have to do is you have to open your aperture so you see more.

I'll give you a perfect example that you know, I quote Lord of the Flies all the time. Lord of the Flies, incredible book. Please go out and get it. Yeah, but it's the biggest lie in the world because a Lord of the Flies was written about a couple of kids, six of them, that stole a boat back in the late '50s, early '60s, and a storm blew him off course and they had to survive for 18 months or 15 months, I can't remember exactly, on their own. And you know what happened? The very first thing that they dictated is, "Hey, we have to have an emergency service. We have to parse out the food. We have to start getting water. We have to make a fire. We have to do." And guess what? When the people picked them up, they had longer hair, but they were in edible shape. Even one kid that had a broken leg, they saved him and everything. But that's not what literary and Hollywood, well, that doesn't mean.

Yeah, yeah. Nobody wants to go and go, "You know, that was great."

Even, even, what's the guy's name that the, The Polar Express actor that's in every movie? Tom Hanks. Yeah. Oh my God. So, so Jesus, Hanks, stop making movies. Okay? He's like the, the Cain of, of this generation. If you remember, he made that one with a volleyball, and it goes away and he had to survive and everything. Yeah. Could it have a happy ending? No, he comes back and his old lady thought he was dead, so she's married to somebody else, and I cry through a box of Kleenex. Brian, there is no apocalypse. It's not pending. Putin could go nuclear, but that's not the biggest problem that you've got day to day. Yeah. Now you get out with that onerous albatross on your shoulders and you're going in and the guy in front of you doesn't hold the door for you at a fast food restaurant joint, and you go high and right. We see that. And take that example, please.

No, that was, that that's a good one because everyone's, you know, walking around with that stuff, you know, on their mind or on their shoulders. And you're going like, "Well, you know, obviously the less critical thinking ability you have, the more that stuff weighs on you." Because you really, precisely. You really think it's affecting your daily life. So if I really think all that stuff is affecting my daily life, one, I, I feel like I don't have control. And if I don't feel like I have control of the situation, you know what, Greg? I, I, I have to have that need, right? So if my life is at, like even my wife gets this way sometimes when she gets overwhelmed at work, and then, you know, the insurgent is acting up, and then something else pops up and she's like, she gets this frustrated. I'm like, "Babe, take a breath. Here's what we can control. Here's what we can't control." Why? Because I have to feel like I, I can control something. So Greg, if I'm walking around and that's how I think, and all that stuff is weighing on my mind, and then you [expletive] up my fry order, guess what? I can't change any. I feel like I can't change.

What's the constant in your life, that fry? And those places pride themselves on that, Brian.

Guess what is what I can do? I can control that situation right now in your face and go, "Give me the, give me another order of fries!" And that's right. You know what I'm saying? That, that's the idea is sometimes it is about feeling of control. I have to have that in my life in some manner. If I'm walking around and I don't feel that, I'll gain it. I'll get it some way, and we'll get it.

Something to me, and you yell, exactly. Honk at me. That's it, buddy. I, I can deal with you because I know I can kick your ass or kill you because I'm a bully. Right? And I know I can pick on you. You listen to me. You are so on to something that I'm telling every one of our listeners and viewers, write that down. Keynote. Go back, play it again. There was a homicide down at a military base in South Central United States. Young guy is now in the trick bag. Shot his wife to death. Said the argument escalated so quickly and so violently that she got a knife, he got a gun. He's saying it's, it's a form of domestic violence related self-defense. We'll see what, what washes out. The most important part of that article, first said, for anybody that dies, anybody, no matter how they die. But Brian, can a situation domestically escalate to a homicide? Of course. All the time.

All the time.

I will kill my kids and myself to say, "So there is that." Not true. They're so volatile they would not lead to murders inside those situations. But that used to be one of the biggest even homicides for, for police officers showing, for police officers now, and it's so volatile. We even had, like, I, I don't know if I've ever told the story, but I had a neighbor, um, when I was growing up, and he was, downtown, you know, Chicago, like, going to work. Took the train in. He's walking in, and like, it's like 8:00, 7:30 in the morning, people out, everything. And some guy is just, like, he comes barreling out of this little, you know, liquor store, convenience store type thing, and he's just beating the [expletive] out of this woman. So everyone's just standing there frozen, like, "Holy [expletive]!" You know? And he naturally, like, this guy would, he, he just jumps right in. Lays this dude out. Jumps on him. Yelling to call the police. Police were kind of close by. They come by and they arrest him. You know, they arrest the guy. But then the cops talk to him and are like, "Hey, man, like, I, I, you know, thanks for what you did, but you have to be careful doing that. And you got to let us get involved, and you shouldn't." And he's like, "What are you talking about? This guy's just beating the [expletive] out of this woman." He goes, "Yeah, but here's the thing. Here's what you don't know is you get on him, you start beating him up, and then what does she do? 'Get the hell off my man!' And starts kicking you and stabbing you or whatever. And guess what? Now what it looks like is you attacked him. And when you go to court, you're the one in trouble." And he's just like, mouth on the floor. He's going like, "What are you taught?" He's like, "Yes, domestic violence situations can just spin so wildly and rapidly."

So we cannot see what we haven't been exposed to. Go and look at Jane Goodall's work with the chimp with the mirror. Yeah, there's one that's going all over online with the bear in the mirror.

I don't know. Oh, yeah, yeah.

And yeah, and he's not sure at first, right? Yeah. At first he's trying to get away, and then he's going, "No, I got to do it." But you can see the mindset that's there. So now, court ordered, I have to switch kids with my wife about the third time. I'm tired of seeing her with another man or another man. And listen, folks, I, I recently said something about a man and woman and everything in between. That's why I don't have to go on and clarify every single human combination. You get what I'm trying to say?

All the usual caveats.

Yeah, if you want to pick a fight over that, kiss my ass. But the idea here is that would a person go to drop off those, those kids, kill the wife, kill himself, kill the kids, you know, not in that order, of course. Yes. And do we see it happen? Yes. Now, Brian, what about an eviction? Is an eviction high dollar amount enough for you? You now are finally going away from the thing that you thought you would have forever, your house, your apartment, your trailer, your shed, whatever else. Right? And some people make the transition to homelessness. Many people that make the transition to homelessness have a mental illness problem that needs to be addressed by your country, and they don't. But what I'm trying to say is will they fight for their shed, tent, the bucket? Okay? So if you already know that, and now you exacerbate that by, let's talk just facts, a lot more people in one spot, and things are a lot more expensive, and we don't know what the [expletive] the government is doing day to day. Now you add to that that we have a situation where the workforce is untrained in this specific thing. We all say, "Oh, school shooters," because that's the first thing on our mind. What about fast food shooters? And then companies say, "Oh, listen, we have training on that." Yet everybody Business Insider interviewed said, "Well, it's funny, we didn't get any training on that." You get how that starts ramping up and it becomes inevitable, Brian. It literally becomes inevitable.

No, you're ramping me up right now. But why at fast food restaurants? Okay? And why these are where the stress facts, right?

The stress fractures.

25%, one quarter of all incidents that happen at these locations happen after hours of darkness. Okay? And now you've got a place that's open 24 hours. So that adds to the, I mean, even if you were using the simplest of scales, what we're doing is we're increasing the likelihood. And the average human gets his wife and kids, or his in the car to go out to a fast food place, or they're just stopping at lunch hour, Brian, and they're in the queue and they're on their phone, you know, texting and stuff, and they're not aware. Listen, stop listening to these [expletive] sites about situation awareness. Situation awareness is nearly one factor.

I'm not, I'm not concerned if they're listening to this podcast. People are already on the ball with that. I, I just think this, in general, in general is this issue when we talk about specifically the events like this, that shootings at a fast food restaurant, it's, it's a greater, you know, analogy for a whole bunch of other different issues, right? Because it shows that there's stress fractures there. Well, where do they break? They break at the weak points. They break, they have areas like, and that's, that's kind of, that's what we're getting at here. So it's not, we're not just talking about obviously, you know, a shooting at a fast food restaurant. We're talking about, we're talking about society at large, as a whole.

As a whole.

This is where you're likely to see things, right? So you can, you, and what you were alluding to and what you were talking about is, you can predict likely outcomes. So now if some financial report comes out at the end of this month and says, "Hey, you know what? Not only did we add another tenth of a percent to inflation, but we, you know, the job numbers report came out and it was far worse than expected." Well, what can we likely expect from that? There's going to be reactions. There's going to be overreactions. Right? There's going to weigh on those certain areas as, you know, the, the people who live in the, like I said, lower end of the association, socioeconomic spectrum, right? They're going to feel it more, so you're going to see more of these types of crimes.

Heroin overdoses, fentanyl overdoses. Yeah. Misuse or abuse of alcohol. Listen, car crashes. You're not road racing for a good long time. Yeah. So, you know, when I'm talking [expletive] and you know, when I'm spot on, and we were, remember, I, I don't think I can say Oceanside because I don't want to get anybody pissed off, but we were in an Oceanside community, okay? Not Oceanside, California. Not, and there's a huge library and outside there was a big water feature. And I remember when we were doing some walkabouts that the person said, "Well, hey, genius," you know, meaning me, "we've got hobos that are coming in and just trashing our bathrooms and they're just [expletive] everywhere and just using the shower and using the facilities. What do we do about that?" And it's like, "Okay, stop and back up for a minute. You're a public building that has the bathrooms open to the public and you don't have to be a library patron to use them." I said, "You need to think of that first to start, you know, thinking out the solution." And I said, "The other thing is close them to people without a library card. They're going to [expletive] on your steps and they're going to wash in that fountain." So you also have to see what are the likely spirals of the decisions that I make. And you remember he was like, you know, "Pshaw," and he walked off. Okay, what happened to that exact library? You follow the math. The idea is you can say, "No loitering here," but that means there's got to be loitering somewhere else. And you can say, "No this here," but that means that you have to do it somewhere else. So be careful what you wish for because you just might get it. And here, what's going to solve this is training and education of the employees. Well, de-escalation, right? And stride with every single order. Those types of things work over the long time.

I, I don't think there's those companies training and educating their, their employees. I mean, what it is is that there's a lot of, like you brought up, that that's a perfect example you see in a lot of places with the, you know, the homeless people coming in, destroying the bathroom, doing that. It's like, "Well, they're, they're here." So you're, you're trying to address a symptom that, I mean, and that's the problem with this, right? So all of these front line people, whether you're working at a fast food restaurant, the library example, anything, you're dealing with the public, right? You're, you only get to deal with the symptoms. You don't get to, you don't get to address the cause of it. You don't get to address the different causes of homelessness that comes from policies and that comes from a legislation that comes from how we use funding. Like because it's a problem, it's just you're not going to get rid of it. It's how do we, how do we deal with it in the best manner? And how do we, how do we try to mitigate it as much as possible? Right? How do we prevent people from getting into that situation in the first place? But you, like you said, work on that door. Like, you know, you don't get to do that. Right? You just have to deal with the symptoms. So I, that's the difficult part. And that's why that becomes your world. That becomes your universe. And so that's the idea if all I can do is address these symptoms, what's the best way? Being realistic. Like you just said, "Well, if I lock them out and say, 'You have to be a, you know, a member of the library. You have to show me your library card before you can go to the bathroom.'" Like you said, "Well, they're just going to [expletive] right there in front of the place."

Like it's like, "So, so, right. Humans have to poop." Right?

Yeah. I, I think there's a book called, I read that book, Everybody Poops. Right? Everybody Poops.

Yeah, it's now a video. It's, yes, they're going to turn it into a movie. You know how Hollywood is. And it's going to be an Avengers that.

That was not the same video, I think you're, you're thinking of, Greg. Now that had nothing to do with them.

Right. I'm a lonely man. Okay, so you got me on that one. I figured about the She-Hulk poops. No, I just have, I just came up with a movie script in three seconds in my head and it's not exactly, well, you're outside of L.A. so you could, you can, uh, shoot up there and put together.

I'll pitch that one to the studios.

I'll drive Disney, I'll buy it. Yeah. You know, so current Disney World. So anyway, forget where we were at. But, but yeah, getting to that is like, you're, you're dealing with those. So, and this is kind of what we talk about is like, all right, how do you, how is a business or an organization or an individual, it's like you have to handle the situation. You're not going to fix it. You're not going to solve the problem. You're likely going to have, you may have to deal with some of the symptoms of these issues. So what's the best way to manage those symptoms? And one is having a good understanding of how these things occur. You know, make it about, like we always tell people, right? Make it about the problem, not about the person. Like, hey, you know, I get pissed off at you, Greg. It's like, well, what, what's the problem, right? Like this, go to the fast food. You're pissed about how many fries you get. Dude, if I work at Carl's Jr. and you come up to me and say, "Hey, you didn't give me enough fries," guess what? You're getting more fries because it's not coming out of my pocket.

Exactly. But funny, logic and reason have largely been abandoned. And, and here I'm going to sound like I'm, I'm being dichotomous. COVID created a situation where we had to hole up with the tribe that we walked into the party with. Yeah. And even then, what that does is limit social growth. It limits interaction. It almost turns on, and in many instances did turn on our survival-based.

Absolutely.

Which means I am willing to fight for this food. I am willing to fight for this person that I may breed with. I am willing to fight for my domicile. And Brian, if you wonder why those people getting evicted are willing to do that, okay, it's a sociological trigger that manifested itself 90 million years ago. Do you get what I'm trying to say? Yeah. So if you think we're going to be able to abandon that, the only way to to mitigate it is to do training. And you said something that I don't exactly agree with, but I just want to say because you didn't go the, the next foot didn't fall. You said that no fast food place is going to want to do this training. Yeah, they are, but they're going to want to do check in the box training. Why? Well, because they can weather the storm. If, if there was a $90 million loss at McDonald's, they're going to close two franchise outlets and let a few managers go, and they'll make that up in the first three weeks. That's the problem. The problem is that it's become so onerous, and there's no argument. I, I don't know all the facts of the case, but I do know that the Byron Allen owns The Weather Channel. Why is that important? Because Byron Allen a long time ago was on a lot of TV shows that we absolutely liked. That, that Real People was one of them and some of the other shows that he did where he went out in the street and got people's interview. And Byron Allen says there's not the same advertising in communities that service people that are of lower income. So he sued for $20 billion or whatever it is, or $200 billion. Good for him. I hope somebody's going to take a look into that. But the point is that he acknowledged through that lawsuit that there's a difference between a McDonald's downtown and uptown, perhaps. Yeah. I don't care how your, your city is set up.

So if we know that this is a problem, just like we know that that school shootings are a problem and, and domestic violence is a problem and drinking and driving is a problem, what we've got to stop doing one is say everybody, every politician stand up, they crow and they say, "We're going to enact Julie's law," and then they forget about it ever. We got to get to sort of a homeostasis where we say certain things are wrong in public places. There's a certain level of modicum of order that you have to, there's a certain level. Address, you can't show up in the arena with nothing on. You can't. But Brian, to do that, we have to have groups of people come together and form a consensus. Yeah. What did COVID do? COVID pulled us into different places and we're wondering why the, the political parties are in such a mess. Why? Because how did we used to solve that? We used to get together and sometimes riot and fight, but many times have a big seminar or a big conference or a big convention. Do you see where I'm going? And so society has to calm society down and until we do that in the schools and in those conventions and on TV and through movies. You show me a movie about people getting together and solving a problem. What's the movie this year about the Tennessee Valley Authority building dams and reclaiming, you know, it's not. What do movies do? Movies go with what's going on. Okay? The zombie and terror and attack and murder and got Hulu shows that about a serial killer and people tune in to see what he's up to this week. That would never happen if things were okay. If things were okay, you get the beautiful happy bird and whistling and I mean, yeah.

With the movie stuff, people are always trying to push, you know, some limit or boundary or capture something or sensationalize. I mean, I mean that's, that's, that's always, that's always been the case.

But isn't that where we started, drive-in shootings, restaurant parking lots? Those have been the place since American Graffiti and before that. And since Vesuvius before that. So we got to stop looking at these as points where we have to intervene and rather even out that baseline, Brian, so it becomes less of a trauma each time one of those things happen. It's, it's just a trend that we can do something about because it's not a trend. I know that's hard to fix.

I mean, it's the, the problem with this is too is that these are things that have to be solved at a local or individual level, and that's what no one wants to do. I can just point to the government as the problem. I can point to the police. I can point to the, the, uh, the gangs. I can point to whatever the hell I want to and say that's the issue if we focus on that. When in fact it's, this is about personal responsibility and individual, you know, I mean, it's that that's it at a very local.

You did a great way of saying that in one sentence what I just danced around for five minutes trying to put in order.

So, so I mean, and and that's always the issue, but that seems more difficult, but in fact, it's, it's actually, it's a, it means it's attainable. It means you can do something. It means, and you literally had an individual, your family, your friends, your local community, like you, you can get better at all this. You can become more resilient. So that's the beauty of it is that to solve these large-scale societal issues, you actually have to take sort of that individual localized approach, and then over time those large-scale issues become smaller. Are they still going to be issues? Absolutely. It's part of being, there's always going to be crime. So what's the best way to reduce it, mitigate it, prevent people from becoming criminals? That should be the focus. You know, I mean, like you, the, the earlier you invest in something, you know, the greater your return. I don't care if that's a new product that's hitting the market, or some new app, or that's a kid in, in a neighborhood that doesn't have all the opportunities. It's simple. If you just focus at that early age, like over time you're go, that's a better return than waiting until they're grown, until they're adults and let's react to what they're doing. But that, that's, that's it is difficult to do. And we and we haven't even hit on half of the different, um, you know, issues that contribute to these things. But I mean, but to say this is, like you said, to say this is new or, "Oh, man, you, you the, the people that sell [expletive] based on fear say, 'You know, in in this ever-changing unpredictable.'" That's my point too about it.

Commercials. I saw the first three, three words of your website or your or your information packet and I [expletive], I, I said, "No thanks," because this is [expletive].

Like a certified [expletive] exactly. That's your view of the world, then you, you lack historical perspective. I mean, it really is. I, I mean, so, so I, I don't, I don't shout out to the cops too. Listen, this is what people, people want to pick a fight. So when they want to pick a fight, they only want to pick this fight, and it's like you can't because every fight is interrelated. So they go, "Okay, when you call 911, what do you expect? You expect police response and what do you expect them to solve the problem? Why do you call cops? Hey, [expletive]'s happening. We want you to come over and fix it." Well, that's, that's, that's again, that's a failure in, in so many different areas and our lack of ability to measure and assess the situation properly. I mean, like you just said, "Well, I want to pick, we, we want to pick a fight so we choose who we pick that fight with." And that choice is often made completely subjectively, completely erroneously that goes back many times spontaneously.

Oh, completely. Yeah. Oh, yeah. That's what we're talking about.

The spontaneous versions of it right here. Or, you know, of that, uh, that order gone wrong at the Jack In The Box, which leads to a gun fight, that's the spontaneous one. But then even as a whole, we sit back up, you know what, Greg? I know what the problem is. It's the, these problems wouldn't happen if we didn't have police. It's like, "Okay, you're right. An innocent person would not get shot by the police if you didn't have a police force." That's a very simple option. Guess what else would happen?

It would happen, though.

I mean, it's, it's like, you know, it's everything we have is a is a system, right? And if you understand it as a system, when you remove something or add something, it affects that entire system.

The entire system.

And you don't always know, you can plan for some of those things of how it's going to work, but you can't plan for everything. It's complex and complexity is very difficult to handle. It's very difficult to understand. And so these complex systems like our society, especially the United States, that happens really fast, fast. And you can go from literally living on the streets to being a billionaire in like five years or less sometimes. Or you can go from that you're at the top of the game, you know, you've accomplished everything and you've made a ton of money to almost living on the streets in, in months, in a year.

Rapid and fast.

That it's, it's hard to comprehend how all that can work. It's because of the complexity of the system and how you can have exponential effects on one small choice.

And that's why you've got to, you got to beta test your own [expletive], bro. I like that. You're exactly right when you're talking about solving it at the lowest level with the least intrusion possible. I'll give you a realistic example of that. Henry Ford back in the days that they were building cars, the automotive companies in Detroit came up with the perfect solution. At their cars other than the glass on the headlights and tail lights, and remember there was one tail light back then, were indestructible. You could hit anything and the car wouldn't dent. You could just rub off the dirt and keep driving on. The problem with that is that they didn't understand physics very well. Right? And when two vehicles collided, the vehicles were in perfect shape, and everybody in time inside the vehicles was turned into ballistic jelly, and they died. So now take a look at that first evolution to where we are now, and cars have crumple zones and airbags and all that. We want to rush to judgment solution just like what's happening tying federal dollars to training programs now and saying you can't have this without that. That's right back to our fast food. You want an order of fries? Yeah. "Well, that only comes with this meal." "Well, what do you mean? Can I just order the fries?" "No." You remember we were going out of Atlanta and headed down to to Benning that time, and I said, "Hey, I'd like an iced coffee." And the guy through the fast food, it was like 2:00 in the morning. You remember that? Shelly was so pissed. And the guy said, "Now we got a hot coffee." I go, "Well, you got ice." He goes, "Yeah." I go, "Can you put some ice in that?" "No, we don't have that." I go, "But you said you got ice and you got." Do you remember the logic there? Yeah. Okay. So what, what, what caused that near fatal? Was that I wasn't coming off the fact that you've got the ingredients, just put it together. He wasn't coming off the fact that it's a drive-through order. "What we got and go." Do you get what I'm trying to say? And that's how we are as people. How many times? I, I don't know if people read papers. I read the paper all the time and I read the editorials. What do the editorials do? "Kiss my ass, your side blows, and this is the only reason that you should follow our side." Now nobody says, "Hey, let's meet in the park, like-minded people, at 1400," yeah, "on Saturday." Do you get what I'm trying to say? And have a social discord? It doesn't happen anymore. And what do I tie that to? COVID. Those bastards. So anytime you limit free expression, anytime, what will a person default to? Their tribe. If I'm not in a tribe, it's going to be like-minded people that mimic my tribe, and that's where the danger is. And we're never going to be able to fight it because it's historical. I mean, it's, it's ingrained, it's our DNA, buddy. It really is.

It is. I, I think we, we need to, yeah, people need to be okay with others having dissenting viewpoints. That's what makes us better.

Bingo.

It makes us better and it makes us stronger. And, and it's okay. You can, you can, I can be friends with someone who disagrees with a lot of the things I believe in. I, I actually do, and that's okay. You know? And I can love my country. I can serve my country. Yeah.

I can be proud of those things and still want to change offensive. Yeah.

And still want to change a lot about it. Exactly, right. And know that we have problems. Yeah, it's okay. You know, we can handle this if we put our, our adult pants on. Or any pants on. I should start with.

I'm going to steal that. We both should start the pants today because I'm not wearing pants. It's Friday, folks. Beta test your own [expletive]. I wasn't going to say it now, so I'm going to steal that. Normally, feel free. Sometimes you say stuff and I just steal it, and you go, "Damn, Brian, that was a good one!" Yeah. And I go, I go, "Years. I told you that before." Yeah.

I'm going to write that down. I go, Greg, you said that on a call two days ago. So I'm like Chris Farley in that apartment in the last like eight hours.

But it's like not just Chris Farley, it's like mixed with Peter Griffin. I would say exactly. But but thinking I'm Stewie. And I'm the chicken.

I'm the chicken that comes in. That's so true. That's so true. All right, so I, I think that kind of, I know yeah, it went to hell in a handbasket.

Yeah.

It, it spiraled wildly out of control. But the takeaways are, those things are on Patreon. Real quick, you know, when we see these things as trends, you know, I always caution people, say, "Well, these things are trending this way." And it's like, "Okay, we don't, we stop. You, you don't have the, the full crime data from 2022 because the year's not over yet. So, so."

Exactly. And it's going to compartmentalize stuff that you're taking whole cloth that's not actually true. Right? You, you can't comport, you can't press those numbers together to fit your likely outcome. That's not fair. You have to read them as is. You have to see the world as it is.

Okay. So I, I think yeah, we got into a number of different, different factors. But every time one of these things occurs, like this is where those stress fractures are at. This is where they're going to break. They're going to break in those type of areas. So you can take that. So when there is a lot of doom and gloom and news on the news, when there's a high-profile suicide on the news, it increases the suicide rate in that area. I mean, that's, that's, it's been, it can't be proven. So like that guy, when you wouldn't handle it, or a girl, when you see someone going crazy and going off somewhere, it's going to lead to someone else doing it. And especially when we feel, when we feel as if we are not in control or things are chaotic, regardless of whether or not they are, if you feel that way, it's the same thing, and that means it's real to you. So, real quick, yeah, you, you're going to bring up something about the, oh no, it's a Patreon. I know you've got a, a great thing that's going to be released on Patreon that'll be Patreon viewers are going to be able to see. I want to hawk that because I only recently understood the whole idea behind Patreon. Folks, Brian keeps, hoards all the [expletive] money from Patreon. So that, that two dollars a year.

I'll let you know or whatever that is. I'll let you know when we actually make a profit on that, by the way.

Well, I know, but what I do like is I like that support and I like that we give them something extra special. So there's going to be a cool thing. I can't tell you what it is, Marren's sworn me to silence. Yeah, but it's going to be on Patreon for you guys starting when you hear this episode. Yeah, yeah, when you hear this episode, it might already be on there actually. So, and, and and I would say to everyone too, before my usual ending, try to beta test your own [expletive].

Brian, that's a great. I'm going to endorse you for that. You're like, "I don't know, it sounds wonderful coming off." I'm going to put that in quotes and throw my name behind it.

All right, everyone, we do appreciate you. Remember, always if you reach out to us any questions or topics that you want to cover, The Human Behavior Podcast@gmail.com. We, we, I always answer the emails and sometimes it does lead to a podcast. So please, we'd love to hear from you. You're all the ones listening, so we thank you so much for listening and thank you for sharing episodes with your friends. We do appreciate that. You know, we always like that if you got a buddy that you think might be interested in a specific episode, send it over to them. That helps us out so much. So thank you so much for that, and don't forget that training changes behavior.