881: I Want What I Want

13:00John Tothill:I love living in the modern world. I adore it. I like the kind of modern food that other people pretend to hate. I eat things like Russell's Burgers. Do you know why? Because I love it. Like, I really love it. People go, what are you talking about? What do you love? All of it. But do you know what I mean? Like, drinking, I love it. But even, like, sitting. oh I love it I really love it you know the irony that I'm a stand up comedian it's the one hour of the day I'm not sat on my ass I love it, I really really love it, I feel that very strongly it's interesting to me that greed and gluttony are separated in religious teaching, I don't think that gluttony belongs on that list of seven deadly sins, I don't think so, I think greed does, but I think gluttony's different.

13:52John Tothill:I think that gluttony is something of a virtue. And I think it should be celebrated. But they are different, aren't they? We don't live in an age of gluttony. Not really. Gone are the days of Edward Dando. Gone are the days of the medieval feudal lord who kind of throws feasts and bakes pies that are birds within birds within birds and that kind of thing. It's over. Nowadays, the modern day equivalent of a feudal lord is just anyone in a friendship group who owns a printer. Tragic. I mean, the stranglehold they have over the rest of us, it's unbelievable. But we don't live in an age of gluttony.

14:25John Tothill:We live in an age of appalling greed. We live in an age of the kind of cruel, scheming, evil greed. But it's the kind of greed which, up close, looks very moderate. It's no surprise to me, our modern-day Silicon Valley overlords, they're not gangrenous Henry VIII's, are they, at all? They're gym bros, you know? Mark Zuckerberg is a gym bro. That guy Brian Johnson or whatever, he's a gym bro. Jeff Bezos is a bit of a gym bro. They take their vitamins, they take their supplements, they optimize their daily routine, they go to the gym, they cut the small talk, they want to expand their territories, they want to live forever.

14:59John Tothill:It's terribly egotistical, greedy behavior. Whereas at least gluttony, it's not selfless, but it's humble, isn't it? Do you think Edward Dando liked going to prison? Of course not. But Edward Dando had the humility to say, I don't matter. My life doesn't matter as much as the celebration of these oysters. You know? The celebration of life. In a similar way, I promise you, my bank balance does not matter as much as the celebration of a Domino's pizza. Do you know what I mean, though? I'm trying to make the point that gluttony is over. The greedy men have won. Drives me mad, because I'm flying the gluttony flag out here.

15:42John Tothill:I believe in gluttony, and I took gluttony to a whole new level. Last year, shocking. So, okay, last year, to fund my Edinburgh Fringe run, I went on a clinical trial, right? So I went on this trial where they gave me malaria. This is true. And I've never got a laugh before. But there's something for everyone on this show. No, seriously, I promise you. I went on this clinical trial that gave me malaria, and actually, it got a bit out of hand. It resulted in a sort of touch, it was a near-death experience, right? I bring this up, because I really felt like last year, after everything that happened, I felt like I really earned my time at the Edinburgh Fringe.

16:16John Tothill:I was hungry for life I wanted to do my show I wanted to watch other people's shows I wanted to hang out I was having a great time and in the spirit of triumph on about day 5 of the Edinburgh Fringe I thought to myself what would Edward Dando do? and I got myself the modern day equivalent of oysters I got myself some cheesy chips I love cheesy chips and I ate these cheesy chips slightly too close to going to bed. And I woke up, unsurprisingly, I woke up in the most extraordinary pain. It was this horrible, dreadful stomach ache. It was like someone was lying on top of me, you know, which they were, got them off.

16:59John Tothill:And then... And, uh... But it was awful. Stomach ache, kind of nasty, like, headache, a fever it was. It was dreadful. I just remember lying there in bed and thinking, okay, I just need to get myself to the bathroom and I will eventually pass these cheesy chips. And I'm in a lot of pain. And actually, I phoned 111, right? And they said, how bad is the pain? And I said, it's pretty bad. It's not as bad as malaria, right? They said, what an incredibly strange thing to say. And they said, look, if it's manageable, the chances are you've probably got food poisoning. I thought, fine, food poisoning?

17:42John Tothill:I don't need to cancel any shows because of food poisoning. I've had malaria. I've had a proper disease. I've been looking forward to the Edinburgh Fringe for months and months and months. I really want to do my show. I'm not going to cancel a show because of food poisoning, for God's sake. So I went on stage. But over the next few days, as I was doing these performances, basically, my body started to shut down, basically. So I would sleep for hours. I'd sleep for 18 hours or whatever. And I'd wake up. I'd take all available pain relief. I'd go and do the show, straight afterwards I'd collapse, and I'd sleep for another 18, 19, 20 hours.

18:20John Tothill:About five days into the illness, I remember phoning up my mum and saying, this is really bad now, this is the worst pain I've ever been in. She said, how bad is it actually? And I remember saying to my mum, I feel like I want to die, I feel like I want to be dead. and she said you said that two weeks ago when you lost your phone and I did so

18:52John Tothill:I'm not a reliable narrator of any of this next bit take this with a pinch of salt now I went to this pharmacy to get more laxatives which is a five minute walk away and I did that walk in 45 minutes so I thought okay right I'm going to have to go to the hospital and hospitals are difficult environments aren't they? Because also the hospital as an adult is a place where you have to kind of advocate for yourself which basically means doing an impression of your own mum you know and that's adulthood isn't it sadly you go around as an adult doing sort of impressions of your own parents until eventually it sticks the other day I roasted a chicken it was like a drag act or something what the fuck's going on here Am I in the opening number of a musical or something?

19:37John Tothill:It's bizarre. So I went into this A &E waiting room, and eventually they said, right, the doctor will see you now. And this doctor, she took me into a curtained-off area. And she said, look, I don't know what's wrong with you, but she said the good news is, with things like abdominal pain, she said, you've left it a very long time to come in. I'd left it seven or eight days, something like that. So she said, because you've left it so long, it's unlikely to be anything that serious. With these abdominal things, if it's something like appendicitis, or if it's a perforated bowel or something like that.

20:06John Tothill:She said, but you'd have been dead by now, right? So she said, actually, the fact that you're still here means it's probably quite mild. It'll be an infection. We'll figure out what it is. We'll give you some tablets, and you can go home. You can probably do your show tonight, if not tomorrow. Great, fine. Took me for a load of scans, figure out what was going on. And she came back with quite a confused, quite grave look on her face. And she said, OK, you're not going to believe this, but it is appendicitis. and I said, oh, isn't that funny? And she said, no.

20:45John Tothill:So she said, in her words, she said, your appendix has not just become infected. She said it hasn't even just ruptured, which is the usual sort of worst case scenario for appendicitis. She said, your appendix ruptured days ago and your appendix has now, in her words, obliterated. She said, your appendix has completely fallen apart and it is now floating around your body. She said, you are in a state called intra-abdominal sepsis. And she said, we need to operate on you in the next few hours or you're going to die. She said, we need to get you to the theatre right now. I said, that's what I've been trying to tell you.

21:27John Tothill:Get me to the theatre. but look I'm not going to pretend it wasn't scary because obviously it was scary suddenly it was a real life emergency they put me in this hospital bed and they bumped me up the urgent surgery list and I woke up from the surgery and the surgeon said this is an exact quote he said yeah when we opened you up we were all a bit like yikes

21:58John Tothill:now they don't they don't know what what causes appendicitis and it's been suggested that excessively fatty diets might lead to appendicitis i was essentially almost killed by my own glattany and then he then he told me off basically he got cross with me and he said in my 25 year career as general surgeon he said i've never seen someone come in that late with appendicitis because of this kind of dogged attitude i had to doing the show every day and i didn't want to cancel it and he said that was really that was dangerous and it was stupid and it was reckless and it was immature and he said if you if you'd have left it one day more you you'd be dead you wouldn't be here and that'd be it and he's really really hard to hear that and not think he's saying that i came in at exactly the right time.

22:58John Tothill:They're saying, yeah, so I was right not to cancel yesterday's show. Thank you. My timing's immaculate. I was incredibly lucky. I feel very, I feel incredibly lucky to survive, you know. Anyway, right. Edward Dando. So. Edward Dando died when he was my age. Edward Dando died when he was 29 years old. He was also a man of timing, actually, because he died just as oysters were starting to become over-farmed and they were falling out of fashion in London and oyster restaurants were starting to close and go out of business. And it'd be really easy to think of the story of Edward Dando as the story of a man who never learned his lesson.

23:37John Tothill:But I don't think that's true. I think Edward Dando did learn his lesson. I think Edward Dando resolved every single time to continue doing the thing that he absolutely loved more than anything else. And as I lay there in that hospital bed, anxious to come back to the Edinburgh Fringe, I thought of Edward Dando in solitary confinement, and I hope that every single time he thought to himself, when I get out of here, do you know what I really fancy? And I hope that for him, every time it was worth the wait, because I can promise you from the bottom of my heart this certainly has been. I beg you, please, be an Edward Dando.

24:19John Tothill:Eat the cheesy chips, drink the champagne, refuse to go hungry in a land of plenty, even if a thing like sepsis or prison gets in your way. And for God's sake, let's go and get some oysters. Thank you very much.

24:39Arielle Knight:John Tothill. I should say the historical record is kind of sparse on Edward Dando. So John took a few liberties to fill in the gaps. He got the gist right. As to whether a fatty diet can cause appendicitis, like they say, more research is needed. John's show is directed by Alex Cartledge and Catherine Craigmile. He's on tour right now across the UK. You can find details on his Instagram, at John Tuthill, producer of Viva DeCornfeld from our show, helping him adapt this story for our program.

25:14Act two, the joy of X.

25:17Arielle Knight:Okay, so sometimes you break up with somebody and you still talk, you're friendly. Some X's you never speak with again. It's harsh, but everybody understands it when somebody's feelings are crushed. It's not unusual. What is unusual is somebody who wants to be in touch with all their exes. I mean all of them. Even the ones who never want to see his face again. The ones who feel really hurt and disappointed. Evan Roberts is a person who wants to reach out like that and become friends with the most hostile of his exes. It's a weird mission that one of our producers, Tobin Lo, was curious about. Evan made a list of 17 exes.

25:57Arielle Knight:By the time he and I met, he had talked with 16 of them over the last several years. It was nice to catch up, get their side of the story. But the more the thing had gone on, the more he realized this whole mission was actually just about X number 17. Someone he referred to as the Big X. A guy named Keith, who even when Evan reached out, did not want to talk. They'd broken up around New Year's. It was 2010. A couple of weeks after... I was on my bike and I was going through the little atrium of the apartment building and getting the mail. And I got this card from Keith. And Keith repurposes cards and envelopes and puts stickers on them and stuff.

26:38Arielle Knight:So I opened it up at the mail. Like, I'm blocking the door, I'm sure. I opened it up at the mailbox. And it is, on the cover is a winter scene. And there's some blue stickers, blue dotted stickers he has on it. and where the sentiment of the card should have been was just a ripped out hole. Keith had torn out the part where there should have been Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays. It was a void. It was like, and I saw through the hole onto my shoe on the floor. On the opposite flap, Keith wrote a note about how he thought he and Evan should stay away from each other. I think most people receiving a holiday card with a heartfelt sentiment surgically removed would think, message received.

27:21Arielle Knight:I will also cut you out of my life, ex-lover. That would be my response anyway. I will be honest, the first time I heard about the fact that you had interviewed all of these exes, I was like horrified by that. I'm such a like, I don't talk to any of my exes, not out of ill will or anything, but it's just like I, it's not a thing I've ever done. Why don't you keep in touch with them? Is it, is it just done? It's, it's like a, it's toast and there's, you can't make toast bread. I feel like the relationship we had exists very much in the time that we were together. And so to revisit it, to me, feels like going to a past life.

28:08Arielle Knight:I don't know the value of that, I guess, for me personally. I just want, I would challenge you, I guess. There are so many other ways that it could be. And this sort of dead version is like the least interesting. And what I kind of realized through some of these interviews is if there was love there once, it's kind of always there for me. Just to say, Evan has been in a happy relationship with his boyfriend for over a decade. But ever since he and Keith broke up 16 years ago, he's wondered, why the card? Why did Keith never want to talk to him again? Why not be friends? Had he missed something when they broke up?

28:49Arielle Knight:Done something bad without realizing it? Evan and Keith met in their early 30s. They dated long distance. Evan lived in San Francisco, Keith and Austin. Evan loved who he was with Keith, so that he felt like himself at a higher octave. Keith helped him apply to film school, which he'd always dreamed about. Keith was outgoing, funny. One time when Keith was visiting Evan, Evan came home to find him fake passed out in the living room with a message spelled out in matchsticks. T-T-O-Y-M-M-H. The thought of you makes me hot. But long distance was hard on them. They broke up a couple of times, would always get back together.

29:28Arielle Knight:They were on one of those breaks when Keith moved to San Francisco. Said, look, we can make a real go of this now. Let's make this work. Evan was surprised, taken aback. And instead of jumping in feet first, he said, okay, but let's take our time, not rush things, which Keith did not take well. His face changed. Something about his whole body changed. And it did feel like a door closing. And did that surprise you? Only because I didn't know that what I said would have that impact. Keith broke up with Evan for good. Afterwards, Evan felt like he was walking around in a fog. It felt like I was stuck on the wrong timeline.

30:14I just felt in a different parallel universe that I wasn't supposed to be in.

30:20Arielle Knight:Almost immediately, Keith got into a different, very serious relationship. Which has only further puzzled Evan. They'd both moved on. Why not become friends now? But Evan's reached out a couple times over the years, and Keith has always been chilly. It's vexed Evan so long it's become a joke with his friends. One of them was in Keith's neighborhood recently and texted Evan about it. His friend joked that he should go take a selfie in front of Keith's house. Evan looked up Keith's address on his computer, copied and pasted into a text to his friend, hit send. Then he realized he had accidentally texted Keith's address to Keith.

30:56Arielle Knight:I screamed when Evan told me this. He thinks he saved it by quickly editing the text to a period, pretending it was an accidental butt text. Did you know you can edit texts on an iPhone? I didn't. Recently, he wrote to Keith one last time, asking if he would talk. I see the email. Keith responded.

31:19Oh my god.

31:22Arielle Knight:Yes, count me in. Keith was game. What the fuck?

31:35Arielle Knight:They talk over Zoom, Keith calling in from Brooklyn. I'm with Evan in his apartment in San Francisco, sitting at his dining room table. Oh my God. Hello. Hello. Can you hear me? I can hear you. Oh my gosh, you sound good. You sound good too. It takes a minute for them to figure out where to start. The usual awkwardness of a Zoom call is made even worse when it's a man talking to his ex-boyfriend. Evan brings up the last time they talked to see if Keith remembers. Do you remember the last time that was? Was it on, like, Bernal Hill? No. Or no? No. Since then. Do you want to guess again? It wasn't on Bernal Hill with my dog?

32:23Arielle Knight:Yeah, I mean, that happened. That was, I mean, I remember that was, but we've had dinner since then. Oh, really? This happens a bunch of times. Whatever Evan brings up, Keith only kind of remembers or doesn't remember at all. Like when Evan brings up the time Keith spelled out his secret message in Matchsticks, one of his favorite memories of their time together. It was The Thought of You Makes Me Hot was your new one. Really? Wow, that's a good one. Keith doesn't remember it. What's worse than having someone be angry at you, never want to see you again? I'll tell you what's worse. Finding out they don't think of you at all.

33:04Arielle Knight:Then they get down to business, start talking about the night of their breakup. And Keith explains he'd hoped that at the end of the night, with them finally in the same city, they could really do the thing, be together. But Evan showed no excitement. In fact, Evan told him, whoa, slow down, one step at a time. I think my impression was that you wanted to be together, but you wanted to be friends. Like it felt like that's what you wanted only. Only. And that was really hard. Like I didn't want that. I wanted you to feel the same way about me that I did about you. Like, I wanted you to, like, rush over and want to, like, embrace.

33:58Arielle Knight:You wanted the rom-com. You wanted us running to each other in the airport. Yeah, totally. That night, Evan actually thought he was saying yes to Keith, but just asking to ease into things. Keith had taken it as being friend-zoned. They both admit that they didn't do a good job of just saying that to each other. Classic. But as much as Keith remembers that moment, he admits he doesn't really remember what happened after that night. Did I just ignore you? Please tell me I didn't just ignore you. There was a breakup card that you sent in the mail with a hole in it. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God.

34:43Arielle Knight:Oh, I remember that. Oh, Lord. It's your masterpiece. Oh my God. Will that be in my retrospective?

34:56Arielle Knight:I mean, I'm not proud to admit this, but I probably wanted to hurt you. I'm sorry. That's not a great card to get. There's particularly one where I put stickers on the outside. That seems like a psychopath. like promising one thing and then being another like hey this is going to be a fun party you know it's been a little weird between us but guess what Evan and Keith talk for over two hours at times their conversation feels a little polite like two well-therapied gay men talking about their trauma while being recorded by a third well-therapied gay man but at least Evan has the answer to why Keith had sent the card, which clears the way for Evan to do the thing he came here to do, make his case that they should have been friends all along.

35:53Arielle Knight:Yeah, I just feel like I wish that we could have figured out how to be friends, that's all. This whole time. Yeah. Like, do you wish that was possible? I just hadn't really thought about it. As a compartmentalizer, I, like, I think I've, until you posed that question, I don't think I've really considered it. But Evan just keeps trying to convince him that he's got it all wrong. I don't – so my – yeah, I don't understand – for me, when I connect with someone, when I have the kind of experience I had with you and with other loves of my life, it feels like such a – like I'm not doing it. I'm investing for a reason and I want someone still in my life.

36:47Arielle Knight:I have wanted you in my life since we broke up. I have needed you.

37:08Are you okay?

37:11Arielle Knight:Yeah. Keith huffs a couple of times, eventually wiping away some tears. He seems overwhelmed, like he wasn't expecting this depth of feeling from Evan. I feel sad. I feel sad about how I handled it, how I communicated, and that I was, like, hurtful to you. and I also just sad for me and who I was then so it just like is placing me in that small room I paid $300 for or something with no furniture and wanting my life to be something that it wasn't and also it makes me sad that you like I think what you said like I like I have needed you as a friend and a person in my life just makes me feel like like just what a waste of time Evan is also taking it in seems flustered it's so weird it's so weird to be right here now Keith I never thought I never thought I'd ever hear any of these things come out of your mouth

38:33Arielle Knight:Keith asks if they can take a break. When we get back on the Zoom, I remind Evan we have one last piece of business. The accidental text. Okay, so you can imagine how... Evan tells him about how his friend had texted him he was in Keith's neighborhood. Their joke about taking a selfie in front of his house. So I copied the address and I texted it to him. And then I realized that I'd sent it to you.

39:03Arielle Knight:really are you serious yes keith gets out his iphone oh god there it is see the period now see where it says edited yeah you can actually press that and see what

39:20Arielle Knight:keith taps on the screen which lets him see the original unedited text with his address Oh my God. See, this is the good thing about stalking somebody who doesn't understand their phone. The way they're laughing, they sound somewhat like, dare I say, friends. The tension in the room is released. They're more relaxed. And Evan, to my surprise, admits that maybe this all was a little bit much. There's all these other little details that I have stuck in my head, But I think part of this also is I might just need to let go of some things too. I just might. Maybe I don't need to hold on to so many details.

40:02Arielle Knight:Yeah. You're a holder-on-er. I'm a holder-on-er for sure. Yeah. About most things in your life, right? Or like. Just you. Really? Just kidding. Just kidding.

40:19Arielle Knight:That's good.

40:28Arielle Knight:you're a holder honor such an intimate observation maybe Evan was right maybe digging up all this old stuff with your exes isn't just a masochistic exercise they say they'll get dinner the next time Keith is in town the call ends leaving Evan and me in the apartment I'm kind of shocked you are? yeah I really came in today kind of worried for you or like not sure what was going to happen. And I feel genuinely convinced that this was a worthwhile exercise, which I'm surprised by. I don't know. I just wanted to say that. I'm so glad you feel that way, actually. I feel vindicated that I convinced you.

41:22Arielle Knight:I talked to Evan again recently. He said Keith came through town. They didn't get dinner, but he's okay with it. He doesn't have any more questions for him.

41:39Arielle Knight:Tobin Lowe is a producer on our program. Coming up, a shirt makes judicial history. Did it commit a murder? Did it embezzle funds? Did it violate the Clean Air Act of 1970? Answers in a minute from Chicago Public Radio when our program continues.

42:18Arielle Knight:full service? Match with a dedicated expert who will do your taxes for you from start to finish, getting you every dollar you deserve. It's that easy. Visit TurboTax.com to match with an expert today. Support for This American Life comes from Alexa Plus. Say hello to Alexa Plus and see how the experience is tailored to you. Planning a vacation? Ask Alexa to recommend a trip. Use Alexa Plus to find the name of that song you love, discover new favorite shows or recipes, and so much more. Ask Alexa Plus anything. And now Alexa Plus is free with Prime on your Amazon devices, like Echo and Fire TV.

42:55Arielle Knight:Get started at Amazon.com slash Alexa Plus. This is American Life from Ira Glass. Today's program, I want what I want. Stories of people deciding to do things that most of us choose not to do. We have arrived at Act 3 of our program. Act 3, The Lawyer, The Judge, and The Wardrobe. So our show today is about people making unusual choices. And we turn now to a judge making a decision this week that everybody who hears about it seems to agree it was a very eccentric decision. Not the kind of decision one usually sees. This happened at a big federal trial in Texas, the Antifa Trial of the Century, in fact, a kind of landmark case for the Trump administration.

43:36Arielle Knight:One of our producers, Zoe Chase, was there for the first day of the trial on Tuesday. You can't record in this federal courtroom, But Zoe took notes on that first day when they were picking the jury, the part of the process that's called voir dire. In Texas, by the way, everybody calls it voir dire. But our Yankee correspondent, Zoe Chase, has no interest in cultural appropriation and is going to stick to her native way of saying it, voir dire. And she now tells us what happened in that courtroom. It was a ventful.

44:05Ira Glass:So Judge Mark Pittman kind of sweeps into the room. All rise. Here's the judge. He's a Trump appointee from the first Trump administration. He's a bit of a showman, charismatic and kind of exciting to hear from. He has a very strong Texas twang. He welcomes in everybody. And, you know, he's like, you should know I have a pet peeve of people who make fun of jury service. I like to quote Frederick Douglass. He says we have three boxes that preserve liberty and justice in this country. the ballot box, the cartridge box, and the jury box. Dramatic pause. And when they get to the part where you're supposed to start questioning the jurors, the voir dire, he goes first.

44:50Ira Glass:He leads it. And I'm in the overflow room, so I can't see the jury. But there's 75 or so of them. There's a big group of them.

45:00Arielle Knight:And they're going to pick 12 people and I guess a couple of alternates, right?

45:04Ira Glass:Right. 12 jurors. three alternates. And the judge starts asking questions to the jurors to see potential bias in the jurors. So he asked them, what kind of experience do you have with law enforcement, which is not an unusual question in a trial like this. And then he goes, do you have strong feelings about what ICE has been doing? Are you pro or con?

45:28Arielle Knight:And let me just say he's asking about ICE because this particular case has, is it nine defendants, Zoe? Yeah, at this point. And they were protesting ISIS actions. They were at an ICE facility.

45:39Ira Glass:Right. I mean, the government would say that they went to attack an ICE facility. And in fact, one of the defendants did allegedly shoot a local police officer and that officer was wounded. And the government's arguing that these defendants were organized. They're part of an Antifa cell. This is the government's big case where they're hoping to show that there is an Antifa. It's a domestic terror group and you can win big convictions on that.

46:06Arielle Knight:And we should say the defense says none of this is true. They say they were not a group. They say these people were not planning an attack. They say they were protesters protesting ICE. Right.

46:17Ira Glass:And so the judge is asking these potential jurors, what are your feelings about ICE? And the way he asks, it's like, do any of you have strong feelings about what ICE is doing, pro or con, is what he says. And he sort of has people raise their hands. But juror after juror is raising their hand and they're saying, yes, I am very upset about what ICE is doing. I do not like what ICE is doing. so this is tarrant county texas it's like a purple district in the middle of the country and this is like the definition of a random sample of people yeah but at least according to people around me like local reporters and people who live in the area this doesn't sound like tarrant county texas to them just person after person saying they're upset about ice And, you know, I don't know, like the judge did bring up Minneapolis.

47:16Ira Glass:And since Minneapolis, a majority of Americans don't approve of what ICE is doing. So maybe that's what this is an example of. Wait, wait.

47:24Arielle Knight:And did anybody, when they raised their hand, did they say, yes, I have a strong feeling about ICE that President Trump is finally delivering on his promises and like I'm very much in favor of what ICE is doing? Does anybody say that?

47:36Ira Glass:No, it's just person after person, no ice, boo ice. And the judge was very focused on this follow-up, which was, okay, can you put aside your feelings about ice? However strong they are, can you sort of leave them outside the courtroom?

47:56Arielle Knight:Which does not seem like a bad question.

47:58Ira Glass:Not at all. But a lot of times they would be like, I don't know if I can. I will try, but I am really upset. And the judge, which seems honest, the judge would kind of push them. So does that mean you can't follow my instructions under the Constitution to consider only what's in front of you? And then they would eventually be like, yes, I can follow your instructions. Most of them ended up saying yes after some pushing from him. And he kept using as an example, he kept being like, you know, I'm an Aggie, so you know how I feel about the University of Texas. But if the University of Texas was on trial, I could put my feelings aside and judge the University of Texas fairly.

48:43Ira Glass:If I can do that, can you do that? And finally, one of the potential jurors in the back and forth said, sort of respectfully, a college rivalry is not the same as human rights.

48:59Arielle Knight:Wow.

49:00Ira Glass:And this anti-ice stuff comes up again. Then when the prosecution gets a chance to ask their questions, one woman just starts out saying, I don't think I can be on this jury. I have two family members who have died after being deported. Another one is like ISIS tactics. The conditions in the detention facilities are horrific. I don't know if I could put my feelings aside. And the government attorney is like, I'm sorry, could you repeat that? She's like, horrific.

49:29Arielle Knight:So things are not going so great for the prosecutors. What happens when the defense attorneys get up and get to ask their questions of the potential jurors?

49:36Ira Glass:Yeah, the defense comes up and right away things go awry. The story really changes here. The first defense attorney comes to ask her questions. This is defense attorney Marquita Clayton. And she brings sort of a poster board to help with her questioning. and the judge sees this and he like freaks. He's like, what is that? Has the prosecution seen that? I haven't seen that. You are not allowed to bring props in here, maybe in state court. This is federal court. Like he's very upset and the poster board is sort of hastily put away. And then she's asking some questions about whether or not you can bring a gun to a protest, what the potential jurors think about that.

50:22Ira Glass:It's a bit of a confusingly phrased question, to be honest, and it's taking a while because she's going juror by juror. And the judge interrupts. He's impatient. He just goes, defense counsel, is this really how you want to use your time? Something like, I've been the most generous federal judge in the history of the world. I've given you guys 90 minutes. This has been going on for 22 minutes. I really think you should consider whether this is a good use of your time, something to that effect. And I want to note, this attorney he's rebuking is a black woman. She's the only black woman attorney, as far as I can see, in a room full of attorneys, the judge, white guy.

51:01Ira Glass:So that's the scene. And then he goes, in fact, you all better have a little visit and think about whether this is how you really want to proceed or something to that effect.

51:11Arielle Knight:You mean you defense attorneys, like, get together, have a timeout, talk about whether this is what you want to do?

51:16Ira Glass:Because I'm here to tell you it's not. And so there's this little recess. And then when he comes back, he's hot. He's upset. And he just starts right into what he's upset about. And he's like, there are very clear rules in this court about having demonstratives in the courtroom.

51:37Arielle Knight:Demonstrative is the poster board.

51:39Ira Glass:Right. You know, bringing any prop with you to the courtroom. And also about what you're wearing in the courtroom. And this attorney, I have just realized, is wearing a shirt.

51:50Arielle Knight:This attorney means the defense attorney.

51:52Ira Glass:Yeah. And indeed, this attorney is wearing a shirt, just wearing a blazer over it that I happened to see earlier in the bathroom. So I saw it up close. It's kind of checkered. It's these little squares, you know, smaller than a cigarette packet of civil rights leaders. Martin Luther King is on there. And it's kind of iconic images of the civil rights movement. And when I saw it, I was like, oh, she put that on because Jesse Jackson just died. We just got the news he died that morning. So it's a shirt honoring protesters. and the judge is like, we've been talking about peaceful protests for 20 minutes and you're wearing a shirt with peaceful protesters on it and the jurors can't unsee that.

52:38Ira Glass:You can't use your clothing to influence the jury. He says that shirt has a politically charged message. It's as if the prosecutor were wearing ice-friendly pins or a shirt with Donald Trump on it, riding an eagle, flying an ice flag. I'm sure the defense would go ballistic if that happened. This is why in England they wear black robes and wigs. I don't think this can be corrected by any type of instruction to the jury. And so I have no choice but to declare a mistrial. Everyone is like, what? Because this is a crazy turn of events. That's like a nuclear bomb to just drop the entire trial and start it over because of this woman's shirt.

53:24Ira Glass:Wait, and what do people do? Well, everyone's just surprised. Like everybody is stunned in the room and the judge is kind of like, I'm going to see what all the attorneys think about this. I should say also the jury is not back from the break. It's like the potential jury is not seeing this whole back and forth. Anyway, the judge polls all the attorneys like, do you guys think there should be a mistrial? And even the government, whose case was supposedly hurt beyond repair because of this shirt, they seem taken aback. They seem surprised by this turn of events. And they say, basically, I don't know.

54:04Ira Glass:They don't co-sign the mistrial. They don't ask for a mistrial. They don't ask for a mistrial. And OK, it is against the rules of the courtroom to wear a shirt like this, a shirt with a message on it. I talked to a federal prosecutor from the same district who agreed with the judge that it could undermine the whole trial. She said if you're going to throw out the whole case and restart it because of a shirt, this was just the first day. You're not losing much. Someone else I talked to, a federal defense attorney in Texas, said she'd never wear a shirt like that to court. But she also said, I don't agree with the judge that there was no other option besides mistrial.

54:44Ira Glass:There are lots of options. You can sanction the lawyer. You could fine them. You can tell the jury to disregard what they've seen. You can ask the jury if they even saw it.

54:53Arielle Knight:So mistrials are rare.

54:54Ira Glass:Mistrials are extremely rare. The judge himself said he'd never called one before in his whole career. Then the judge, it's not over. He says he needs a break to go review the law. And he kind of sweeps out of there. I go back into the hallway and I see one of the defense attorneys. And I'm like, dude, what is going on? Like, is there going to be a mistrial because of her shirt? And he's like, it's not the shirt. The judge doesn't like the jury panel. And I'm like, why? And he's like, because they hate ice. and that the shirt is the MacGuffin in order to restart this whole thing and get a new jury pool to choose from.

55:36Arielle Knight:And do you think that might be true? I mean, that is pure speculation.

55:41Ira Glass:That is not what the judge said. That's not the stated reason for calling a mistrial. And later, that defense lawyer pulled it back. He was like, I really don't know. But it was a significant thing how many people were against ICE over and over and people saying they wouldn't be able to put their feelings aside over and over.

56:01Arielle Knight:How many people was it?

56:03Ira Glass:18 to 20. I know we're talking about a jury pool of 70 plus people, but the way the process works, the prosecution would not necessarily be able to block all the jurors who hated ICE if that's what they wanted to do. Just because of the rules of the game.

56:20Arielle Knight:But if the judge, in fact, is doing this because he doesn't want people who have strong feelings against these law enforcement figures to be on a jury that's about these law enforcement figures. Like, that's not so strange. It seems like that would happen in any courtroom for any trial involving law enforcement figures.

56:36Ira Glass:Yeah, that's not a weird goal at all. It's potential bias, their feelings about ICE. It's not strange the judge would want that at all. But it is strange to call a mistrial. and there is a clue that something else was going on with this judge, which was at the end of this strange day in court, he calls the jury back in and he gives this little speech and it kind of comes out of nowhere. He talks again about how much jury service matters and this should be a place where you can set your personal politics aside. And then he says, I'm disgusted by where America is today, how hopelessly divided we are over politics.

57:19Ira Glass:In the 1850s, Abraham Lincoln said, a house divided against itself cannot stand. I don't want my sons to fight in the next Civil War. We have to find a way to turn down the anger and the hatred. Wait, what? I know. Everyone around me was looking at each other like, what was that? And I think he was frustrated by how impossible it seemed to create a room right now that is what a courtroom is supposed to be. Neutral ground. He said over and over during the whole day how important it is to get an unbiased jury that only considers the facts in front of them, to have a room with no politics in it. The shirt violated that, and possibly the juror's answers about ICE.

58:07Ira Glass:But of course the problem in trying to create an apolitical trial is the very premise of this trial is so political. It's about the stuff being debated literally every day all the time. It's ICE, Trump, Antifa, Antifa versus ICE. Maybe there's a room somewhere you could discuss it objectively. I just don't know if that room exists in the United States. Okay, and so Zoe, I think what you're saying is,

58:33Arielle Knight:I think your big conclusion today is you're saying we are a very divided country? You heard it here first.

58:50Arielle Knight:Zoe Chase is one of the producers of our program

59:11Arielle Knight:What you want, Walt, then you want it And I want you Our program was produced today by Diane Wu. The people who put together to today's show include Fia Benin, Dana Chivas, Michael Comete, Emmanuel Jochi, Hanan Joppy Wald, Valerie Kipnis, Molly Marcello, Catherine Raimondo, Stone Nelson, Ryan Rummary, Lars Storcheski, Ruthie Petito, Francis Swanson, Christopher Sotala, Julie Whittaker, and Nancy Obdike. Our managing editor, Sarah Abdurahman. Our senior editor is David Kestenbaum. Our executive editor is Emmanuel Berry. Special thanks to Jiayung Phan. Telawani Osi Bemowo, Stephen Monticelli, Chris Impey, and Arno Mokros.

59:45Arielle Knight:The family of the bees that we had at the top of the show from the film The Boys and the Bees, Nehemiah Ray and his kids and wife, they are active on Instagram. You can find them at raisedwild. The spelling's kind of specialized here. It's the name Ray, R-A-Y-S-D, then the word wild. At raisedwild. Our website, thisamericanlife.org, where you can listen to our archive of over 850 shows for absolutely free. This American Life is distributed by PRX, the public radio exchange. Thanks as always to our program's co-founder, Mr. Tori Malatia. You know, Tori, he is the master of swap bait. Any deal you're offering, he is completely stone-faced.

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