Details Are Sketchy
A bimonthly true crime podcast, in which two friends share an unsolved disappearance or unsolved case, a crime they're most intrigued by, and talk all things true crime.
Details Are Sketchy
Trier and Salem Witch Trials
This week, Kiki brings us two stories of witchcraft and hysteria. We're also celebrating our one-year anniversary and Halloween. There's no missing person case this week.
Our next book is "Long Haul: Hunting the Highway Serial Killers" by Frank Figliuzzi, which we will discuss in episode 28.
Sources:
Witches: The Truth Behind the Trials -- episodes 1 and 2.
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Instagram: Kiki - @kikileona84
Instagram: Rachel - @eeniemanimeenienailz
Email: details.are.sketchy.pod@gmail.com
I'm Kiki and I'm Rachel and this is. Details are Sketchy, a true crime podcast, and this is our 27th episode. It will be coming out a year to the day that I think our first one came out First anniversary Assuming I get my shit together this weekend and actually edit everything and it's also our Halloween episode. Yep everything, and it's also our halloween episode, yep, but we spent most of our time making our celebratory cocktails we sure did so we don't have a missing person again, but we will next next episode episode 20 I put my energy into making masterpiece cocktails oh shit, the next one's 28.
Speaker 1:Does that mean we have to have her booked out? Is this 27 or 26?
Speaker 2:I'm really. I want to say it's 27 fused. At this point I don't know. I mean, I'm pretty sure it's 27, or it could be 28.
Speaker 1:All right, you check well, I know today's not the 28th, but I I just mean no, I'm not saying it's the 28th, I the 27th. I don't know what we're talking about. I don't know what's happening anymore. Okay, well, shit, it is the 27th. So next week we got to have our book read.
Speaker 2:Don't make me laugh. Every time I laugh I have a coughing fit.
Speaker 1:Well, don't do that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I don't want to eat one of those cough drops, because then I won't be able to taste this delicious cocktail that we made those cough drops. Are you found the recipe? I executed the recipe. It tastes like. Did you ever drink like Kern's nectar? No, oh my gosh. Wow, that was a delicious beverage that I used to think oh my gosh, this is so healthy. It's just fruit juice. Yeah, it's not even like this.
Speaker 1:I did the Kern's.
Speaker 2:Guava.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the pink guava.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's like not, it's like 5% juice or something. Yeah, it's like a juice drink. Yeah, but A delicious one. Yeah, yeah, but uh a delicious one.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it is very delicious, um, but they're pina colada flavor.
Speaker 2:This tastes a lot like that nice. So nostalgia, yeah, with booze.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, so this is also our halloween episode. So I, instead of doing a crime that happened on halloween, because I was thinking of the candy man yeah, it was the dude that killed his son and did the whole like, oh, candy might be, yeah, uh, poisoned or whatever uh, instead I thought about witches witches being halloweeny, and so I thought about the salem witch trial, since I just had to teach it a month ago, right, and so I looked up stuff the way he says salem witch trials.
Speaker 2:it sounded like sandwich trials. Oh, I'm like hell yeah, sandwich trials. Tell me about it.
Speaker 1:So I decided to do so. I found this new series it's several episodes, so it's probably only just a one series thing about different witch trials that have happened, starting with the first one in germany and then the second one's about the salem witch trials.
Speaker 2:so those are the two I'm gonna do half of this episode is gonna be me starting to laugh and then coughing.
Speaker 1:Very, very sexy stuff yes, okay, so I do have some trigger warnings. Uh, you know the usual sexism because witches, religious persecution, also because of witches, religious fanaticism, mention of various forms of torture and executions of innocent people. So just a little side note, because I thought the little statistic was interesting Nearly 60,000 people, mostly women, around 80% or so, were put to death for the crime of witchcraft over the course of two centuries. That's a lot of people, particularly for that point in time yeah you know that's a lot and that's only in europe, that's.
Speaker 1:That doesn't include any sort of similar type of thing that happened anywhere else.
Speaker 2:We really hate women. What's a way that we can kill women who act?
Speaker 1:different or stuff. Oh, this one guy I'm going to talk about was definitely. He definitely had some issues with women. Yeah, okay.
Speaker 2:I bet that if certain people could get away with that today, that they most certainly would.
Speaker 1:Oh, without question. So background information before we actually get to the trials. So the idea of a witch actually begins right at the beginning of recorded human time. In ancient times, a witch was someone who did harm in a community by magical means. They could do it using anything you might find in a natural trial or anything like that, because they'd be thought of as an asset to the community, because if they could do bad magic, then they could also do good magic, like healing people or changing the weather from bad weather to good weather. So magic at that time was a very flexible force.
Speaker 2:Well, and let me interject a question weren't a lot of like people who were considered witches or whatever? Didn't they just do a lot of like herbalist stuff, like herbalist, like kind of healing and yeah and shit like that? Yeah which at that time was pretty legit medicine, because medicine at that time was real shit yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, I mean, medicine at that time was herbal. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, no, it didn't really a witch. I don't think that really became much of a thing until, like medicine as we not even as we think of it but medicine as a profession, yeah, came into being and it began, became dominated by men. Okay, uh, but perceptions of witches and magic begin to change by the 13th and 14th centuries so that's gonna be the 1200s and 1300, and the world became dangerous for anyone who was believed to be a witch.
Speaker 1:And if we think about it this, and all the way up to really the late 1600s, 1700s, even into the 1800s, it was not an easy time to be alive. But particularly in the centuries we're talking about, there's widespread war across Europe, most of it religious, between Catholics, protestants and other emerging sects. There's also wide-scale epidemics, especially the bubonic plague, which killed people in very large numbers. Sickness in general was just very common, much more so than today, and even the stuff we still get today, like colds and stuff back then would have been quite deadly for a lot of people, particularly for children and elderly relatives. And on top of that, you want to know how they got in it.
Speaker 1:I mean, germ theory didn't even come around to the late 1800s. So you didn't really know how people got sick. It seemed sort of magical, it seemed natural to just kind of blame evil, particularly if you're a religious person. People, again, they have no way of explaining disease and they don't really have any way of explaining bad weather either, or any weather really. I mean, they don't really have any knowledge of biology. Sorry, it's okay, they don't really have any knowledge of biology, pathology, meteorology, any of that stuff. And let's not forget I don't know if I mentioned it or not, but this is also the time of the Little Ice Age.
Speaker 2:So crops and A Little Ice Age sounds really good right now.
Speaker 1:It does, although we probably might starve, you know, because it would be like year-long winters, you know. So witchcraft becomes a reasonable explanation for why lives are ruined, their children, livestock crops are dying and why their homes burned down. And not only do they now have an explanation, but if you say witchcraft is the issue, you then also have suspects. Yeah, by the end of the 15th century so that's gonna be the 1400s fear of witchcraft in European society then became tied up in the fear of heresy. So just a definition a heretic is someone who, according to church authority, does not follow the rules, regulations or beliefs of christian orthodoxy.
Speaker 1:So you're going to want to remember that stick a pin in it when we talk about the types of women who were getting so fast you and I would not survive the rich trials in the period of the 15th to 18th centuries.
Speaker 1:nations are really more like theocracies. People are not comfortable dealing with all these different divergent views, though, that are popping up, not just between Catholic and Protestant, but even within the Protestant communities. I have to talk about this all the time when we get into the Puritans. Puritans weren't even tolerant of other Puritans. No, they sure weren't one right religion, particularly if you believe in christianity there's always just one right one.
Speaker 2:Puritanism is so predicated on, just like constant judging of everything and everyone around you yep, although I think early catholicism is also kind of like that.
Speaker 1:Sure, I'm not saying it wasn't, but yeah, no, puritanism was particularly um. Yeah, they did enjoy reading, though, and you have to give them credit. I mean, they got here and they almost immediately started up a college sure, harvard granted, it was for theology, but at least they like their books I'm not feeling too cozy towards no i'mans, no. I'm just, I'm trying to have a pleasant spin on anything.
Speaker 2:They used to murder the Quakers.
Speaker 1:Yes, I know. No, they were not. They were not. They were not a kind people. No, not even to each other. Okay, so in the period of the 15th to the 18th centuries, so the 1400s to the 1700s, nations are really more like theocracies. I just said that, okay, people are not comfortable dealing with all these different divergent views and of course, there's only supposed to be one right one. So the church, this being the Catholic Church mainly decided that witches and heretics are very much alike. All of the things that people have been thinking about before various good kinds of magic, medicinal things like manipulating the weather get swept up into this new definition of what a witch is. So now, a witch is not only someone who does harm to their community, but does it because of the devil.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Witches. The devil made them do it. Yeah, the witches, I'm sorry, not the witches. Witches now might make a pact with the devil. So, for example, they would be given power in exchange for handing over their body and soul to the devil and for worshiping the devil I wish I could get some power in exchange for worshiping the devil. It's true, though, like if it were like that fucking easy all right, like I know, yeah, and I mean, some of these sabbaths sound like a good time, these devil sabbaths.
Speaker 2:I mean according to, like these religions, like most of these people are going to hell anyway, so like why the hell wouldn't you?
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, or not preordained, predestined, yeah, okay. So it became more and more likely that witches would be women, because of the underlying view in all countries European countries that women were the weaker sex. Women are weaker, so they're more susceptible to the devil's temptations, which, if you think about it, just seems so weird. Like everybody's, like women are so tempting to men, like you got to cover up everything because men are tempted, doesn't that mean men are more?
Speaker 2:weak right and and and, yeah, I. And. Because their whole rhetoric right is because the devil right tempted Eve to eat from the forbidden fruit, right, but all it took for Adam was for Eve to say here, eat this fruit.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So the Catholic Church decides that there really are witches and that it's the church's job to find them. So now we have this perfect storm for witch hunts. We have intense religious tension, lots of warfare. We're already prone to persecution. We've got bad weather because it's the Ice Age oh sorry, little Ice Age. We've got bad weather because it's the Ice Age oh sorry, little Ice Age. And then we have a new idea of a satanic crusade using witches.
Speaker 1:Yeah, throughout the 15th century there were sporadic witch trials. Also, there were a number of writings on demonology. A demonologist is an expert in a way that demons work, but in the 1400s a demonologist would increasingly look at how witches worked as well. So demonologists also became an expert on witches, and so witches became demons. They didn't say it, they declared it. They declared it. An important demonologist of the time was a Dominican monk named Heinrich Kramer. His hunt for witches begins as a one-man crusade. He believed deeply that women were weak in every respect their bodies, their minds and their souls. So, anyway's, he goes to rome and received an official writ by the pope that declares him to him by the way, him, not other people, just him to be responsible for eradicating witches in southern germany.
Speaker 2:He just got a writ from the pope, just like that just like that.
Speaker 1:I mean, I'm sure there was more to it, but I mean this is a 45 minute episode so I don't. They didn't really go into it and it was 10 o'clock at night, so I did not google. Yeah, in 1485. Well, actually I did google and it just said the same thing. So, right in 1485, kramer begins as kramer begins as trial.
Speaker 1:Kramer begins a trial in innsbruck, austria. So just an fyi, I think'll probably say this later on, but what is now? Germany and Austria and other parts of that area were actually just the Roman Holy Empire. Germany didn't exist as a nation, and neither did Austria. They were the Holy Roman Empire. So he encouraged people to denounce other people that they regarded as witches. So he gets the name of seven women, and he becomes very interested in helena. Shall, shall we bring shower baron? Shower baron, sure, she will be the first accused and brought to court. Some of the local clergy, though, actually intervene in her trial, because they don't believe kramer or his accusations. And he? They think he is crazy, they think he's a loon. No, uh, the trial is an absolute fiasco, and he is basically, you know, pitchforks and all thrown out of town any word on why he picked her?
Speaker 1:um, they didn't say, but I think it's probably because she was a little bit older, yeah, and probably a little more independent. Oh, um, they didn't say that, but that's kind of how it came off reading between the lines, all their women who can stand on their own feet.
Speaker 2:How dare they?
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm. So he is so upset by the failure in Innsbruck that he writes guess what book.
Speaker 2:What book Death to Women.
Speaker 1:Malleus Maleficarum, also known as the hammer of witches.
Speaker 2:It is full of the hammer of witches. Is he the hammer?
Speaker 1:pretty much every anybody who hunts witches is a hammer.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like um have you ever seen like dr horrible? And uh, have you seen that like dr horrible?
Speaker 1:yeah, with nathan phillian the musical yeah, yeah, um what's his name um neil patrick harris?
Speaker 2:neil patrick harris, yeah, exactly, and felicia day yeah and uh uh, nathan phillian is like, he's like the bad guy, but he's the good guy, right neil patrick harris is the bad guy, but he's the good guy, right?
Speaker 2:neil patrick harris is the bad guy, but he's the good guy, right. And uh, neil patrick harris and and nathan filling they're both competing, like for felicia day. And and um, neil or nathan filling tells neil patrick harris that he's gonna give felicia day the hammer, and the hammer is his penis I don't remember that, but that's hilarious, sure, sure it is anyway, that's what yeah, no, I know it does sound.
Speaker 1:I mean the hammer of witches does sound uh mildly sexual in nature.
Speaker 2:I mean, I'm sure there is some kind of like you know, weird sex thing hate yeah, I don't doubt it in soul shit yeah ancient insoles yeah, it is full of everything a wind, a witch hunter.
Speaker 1:A witch hunter needs to know about witches and witch hunting. It's their Bible, as it were, for centuries. And interesting translation side notes. I love.
Speaker 2:Do they call it their Bible? No, oh, okay, I was going to say isn't that heresy?
Speaker 1:No, I said it was their Bible. Oh, okay, no. So I love a good translation side note. So this translation side note is that the actual literal translation of Malleus Maleficarum is the hammer of the female evildoers.
Speaker 2:So does witch mean female evildoer.
Speaker 1:I would assume so I don't really know which mean female evildoer, I would assume, so I don't really know. What Kramer actually does is change the emphasis for what witchcraft was. So this is that whole now it's heretical instead of just harmful. But he changes it specifically for the elite, educated men.
Speaker 2:If you're thinking about it that way, like whatever evildoer, does that mean that it doesn't have to be a perception of any kind of supernatural origin there, just has? To be a perception of wrongdoing or evildoing?
Speaker 1:No, because I think evil would be supernatural, okay. No, because I think evil would be supernatural, okay. And in Malleus Maleficarum, kramer argues that there's no need for lawyers because they are obsessed with small details like whether or not their client is guilty.
Speaker 1:Right, you can just do away with those. Exactly so. Instead, suspected witches should be tortured as soon as possible Makes sense. Yeah, the book becomes very popular in what is now Germany, austria and Switzerland. Now witches are seen as a serious threat to the Christian world and panic grows in Germany where one of the first mass witch trials begins. And, to be clear, it's not just because of the book, it's just kind of all the perfect storms that come together.
Speaker 1:Germany is a hot spot for religious conflict in the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries, so that's going to be the 1400s to the 1600s, and so Germans are probably thinking more about what role the devil plays in their lives. Germans are probably thinking more about what role the devil plays in their lives. Yeah, the temptation to believe in the wrong thing, to sin, etc. Maybe then they are going to be more prone to having witch trials. Is what one of the scholars argues. Maybe that's why it starts off in Germany and took most of the trials took place modern day germany again, I think I just said this, but we'll go over it again. Uh, doesn't exist at this time. It's part of a bigger, very politically fragmented and that's important fragmented entity called the holy roman empire.
Speaker 1:So this means that political and legal authority is really left to regional and territorial rulers so in the 1580s, trier is an independent state ruled by a counter-reformation roman catholic fanatic named johann von schoenberg I'm going to be calling him the prince elector, uh, from this point on. So he believes that satan is out to destroy the catholic church using witches as instruments, and he is determined to keep trier from free from witches. So I just want to be clear when we're talking about trier, we're talking about all of cheer, but I'm also going to be talking about the city of Trier.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:So things are not good in Trier. They are getting hailstorms and frosts during the summer and early autumns, which means their crops are damaged. And because their crops are damaged, they're losing their livelihoods. And since witches can control the weather, it must be their fault. Trier, like other places, has special village committees whose only purpose is to identify witches. And, by the way, these are not like the typical witch hunters who would know about all these.
Speaker 2:These are just like random people with no education who decide who witches are right one of the things that super interests me about, like christianity and different interpretations of christianity, is like the variable amounts of power. Yeah, the devil is supposed to have like, in some instances like very little power yeah in other instances, like he's got so much power, you can give these witches enough power to cause hailstorms and all this chaos and things of that nature treer, like other places, have special village committees whose only purpose is to identify witches.
Speaker 1:And here's the way it works If a person knew of someone who was likely to have a pact with the devil, they would inform the committee and the committee would collect evidence and hear witnesses.
Speaker 1:Once all of that's collected, they pay a clerk and the information is given to the official of the prince elector and the accused would be arrested and then they would be taken to court, and, generally speaking, in Trier.
Speaker 1:That court would be in the city of Trier, or at least they would be kept at the city of Trier. It was unclear to me if that's where the trials would also be held, because, like when we talk about the Salem witch trials, they're kept up in Boston. So these committees though these are all the ones I'm talking about these are all like village committees. They're in the the territory of Trier rather than the city, so they don't really have an impact on the city of Trier, except in an emotional way, because, since these accused witches are going to Trier to be held for court, people are now starting to think about witches, and so there were rumors that witches escaped into the city to avoid being arrested, and there's a bit of a fervor and a lot more people get arrested, and so much so that prisons are filled with suspected witches like filled to the brim.
Speaker 2:There isn't enough room so people did flee, or they were just like. We think that so-and-so will flee and therefore lock them up.
Speaker 1:So they think that witches who don't want to be arrested are fleeing into the city of Trier. Yeah, and so now the city of Trier is being inundated with witches, along with those who are accused and sitting in jail, with witches along with those who are accused and sitting in jail. So then they start arresting more people, because they think those people have been are escapees from other places or runaways from other places. So 1582. Witchcraft at that point in time at least in Germany, was considered an exceptional crime, which meant that things could be sped up. So you don't have to have in other words, they didn't have to have the typical trial that you normally would, and the whole procedure, from arrest to accusation to trial to execution, would take one week. In many cases they wouldn't even hear witnesses, they would just interrogate the accused. Yeah, as we all know, for most crimes you prove guilt by hearing witnesses and with physical evidence, but magic is invisible, so those rules obviously don't apply, and so that is where torture comes in.
Speaker 2:Nothing applies, just whatever they say. Yes, exactly.
Speaker 1:So trials, however, do take place in an established court overseen by a judge who, in these cases, would be all powerful. The judge in trier is dietrich flada, who is described as being ruthless and unforgiving. Now, having said that, I googled it. I mean this is coming from an actual scholar and the googling came from wikipedia, so take it as you will, but according to wiki and whatever scholars they used, this dude went really soft on witches. Yeah, like in terms of torture, but then he went soft on torture yeah, compared, compared to others, just a little torture.
Speaker 1:Uh, compared to others, yes, apparently. But then this scholar was like no, he didn't, he was ruthless, he was unforgiving and he was also a money lender and he really was not nice to people who owed him money, and this is kind of like they're just getting started on witches, right.
Speaker 2:So this is kind of setting the standards. This is setting the precedents, yeah, which is right, so this is kind of setting the standards and then later on maybe they're like well, let's build on that foundation and ramp it up even more.
Speaker 1:Well, it certainly became much more popular and a lot of this, though you know, what's crazy is it's not just the actual church that's doing this Public. I mean, this stuff. This is the age of the printing press, right? And so all of these things become so popular and people are really afraid of these things, so they ask for witch trials. And they demand witch trials, like even when judges and things are like I don't know about this. The people are like you better fucking do it or we're going to burn you too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know so it's nuts, but what I was saying is that maybe things got even more intense later on, right, because they took those techniques and then they made them even worse or built on them. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:I know what you mean them. You know what I mean, I know what you mean, but so, like all of this, none of none of the scholars here said any. They used any other torture other than the one that I'm gonna talk about. Okay let's hear about it. Uh, in salem they did use one other version of torture, but I mean they didn't really go into a whole lot of detail, but but yeah, nobody would have seen anything wrong with it being ramped up, because they really believed that these people weren't people.
Speaker 2:Well, this was a pretty tortury time, sure Right, mm-hmm, not just witches, of course no. But like other kinds of circumstances.
Speaker 1:Yeah. We also have to remember, though, that a lot of the things that we think people used at torture actually never. There's no evidence that they actually really happened, and I'm not talking just about the witches, but, like a lot of people think, about the iron maiden but there's no actual evidence of that. The only, the preferred torture is the one I'm going to talk about, because it was easy and very effective.
Speaker 2:Yeah, by no evidence you mean like nobody is like writing about Iron Maidens and being like we used the Iron Maiden.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like there's absolutely no record that an Iron Maiden was used, but the main torture would have been effective enough.
Speaker 2:yeah, um, that reminds me of that scene from bill and ted's bogus journey where they're like they like travel or whatever, to medieval times and they get in some trouble with some, some knights or whatever, but of course they're complete dumbasses and right. So they get arrested and they're like put them in the iron maiden and they're like excellent, right and then they're like torture them yeah, and they're like bogus, do you remember?
Speaker 1:that vaguely yeah it's been a really long time since I saw, since I saw that, but yeah, I should go back to those movies. We should, we should, okay. So so he very much, this vlada very much believed in witchcraft and he was present at the questioning and the torture and he also would look for better measures to bring out confessions, and so that kind of goes against what Wiki was saying.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And by better, of course, I don't mean kinder or less tortury. Not many trial records survive, but one is of a washerwoman named Margarita Braun. She was accused of being a witch in public, in the marketplace, for everyone to hear. So if you are ever going to be accused of being a witch, you do not want it to be in a place where everybody yeah here's, here's you being accused, because there's no getting out of that.
Speaker 2:You cannot say no, you're wrong, I'm not a witch then everybody's gonna be like well, I heard she's a witch exactly, and there's, there's nothing.
Speaker 1:There's no way to defend yourself. You are, for all intents of purposes, a witch, yeah, so don't piss anybody off who would accuse you ever? Yeah, she was arrested and, poor lady, tortured seven times but didn't confess and I will talk about the torture later on. So flotta steps in and subjects her to even more torture and apparently this time it was enough for her to confess. But the only thing she confesses is to a venial sin, meaning a sin that's not really a sin.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so what's the method of torture that they're using for these I'm going to talk about?
Speaker 1:it later. Okay, so she confesses to eating meat in broth. Uh-oh, which, as a Catholic and I think she did it she admitted to doing it on a fast day, which you're not supposed to have. You can have broth, meat broth, but you can't have meat in broth. A good portion of trial record is lost, so it's unknown if she was executed or not. Some think she was just because of the amount and severity of the torture that she endured.
Speaker 1:Obviously eating meat in broth on a fast day is a sin worthy of execution. Well, I doubt that it was because they executed her because of that, but it would just Well, obviously she's just lying because she's a witch. Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1:Accusations and trials continue to spread across Trier, hundreds are interrogated and confessions grow wild. And then a conspiracy emerges they believe witches are gathering in large numbers Because some of these people are just letting their imaginations run wild, these people who are confessing, and so they believe witches are gathering in large numbers, and they have to explain how witches could get to witches' Sabbaths in large numbers at night. And that is where we get the idea of the flying witches.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:At these Sabbaths, it is believed that they are worshipipping the devil, of course, having sex with the devil, sacrificing children, eating babies.
Speaker 2:I mean, you'd think, if anybody's good at sex, it's the devil Right.
Speaker 1:That's why I'm saying it sounded like fun and plotting their acts of harm against the communities around them. And the idea that there is a witch's Sabbath suggests there's a big group of witches out there. And if that's true, then it's not enough for the accused to admit that they were there. They now have to also say who else was there. And suddenly the accused are starting to see prominent citizens at these Sabbaths. And then we have children's testimony being allowed in. For example, one teenager who was giving witness about witches claimed that he was taken to one of these Sabbaths and saw Flotta, mr Judge, himself. Other witnesses emerged to tell of his terrible deeds Suddenly confessed.
Speaker 1:Witches are saying Flotta was the master of the Sabbath. They say that he's making money off the bad weather. So again, witches control the weather and they are the ones making the crops fail. And that works to the advantage of Flotta and men like him, because they've got stocks in stores of grain and are selling those stores of grain at a high profit. Yes, sometimes it doesn't pay to be rich.
Speaker 1:Flotta was a big supporter of the prince elector who in turn didn't let the trial against Flotta begin. But then in 1588, a commission is established to look for circumstantial evidence for all the denunciations made against flotta. While he hasn't had a trial yet, he has pretty much already been convicted in the court of public opinion. Yeah, and then? What really made things bad for him, though, is that there were accusations that he agreed to try and murder his master, the prince-elector, while making his deal with the devil Again his master, the prince-elector.
Speaker 1:Bad luck for Flotta was not in very good health at the time, and no one could figure out why. The answer, then, must be that someone was trying to kill him through bewitchment, and since Flotta made that pact with the devil, then he must go on trial. He and all the accused would likely have been tortured using the popular method that was preferred at the time, called the strapato. Hands are tied behind your back, a rope is tied around your wrist, and the rope would be put through a hook in the ceiling, and someone on the other end would pull the rope. This method can cause tears in the ligaments and tendons, which would be excruciating. On top of that, though, you might also be beaten in that position, you might have fractures and broken bones, and you also might be beaten on your head at the same time, and you could be left like that for hours, for days, for weeks, and he's tortured like that for months until he finally broke and he confesses.
Speaker 1:He confessed to meeting with the devil, having sex with the devil. He made a pact with the devil as well and was given the ability to use magic to his own advantage. He admitted to having planned to kill people and to make people sick and he said he had gone to the Sabbath and accepted his role as master of the witches I'm sorry, not of the witches of witches. September 16th, 1589, the verdict comes in. He is found guilty of witchcraft and sentenced to death. Now again, there's fragments and stuff, so they don't really know how he was executed. But one source says that he was burned at the stake. But again, nobody really knows if he actually was burned at the stake, because pretty much everybody were killed by other means, usually strangling or beheading, before their bodies were burned. The burning part would have happened. Yeah, and I'll talk about why, I think, in a minute. The reason for burning witches is because witches are not just criminals, remember. They're heretics and it was believed at the time that the bodies of heretics were actually unclean and could bring misfortune upon the community. So, alive or dead, a heretic's corpse needed to be burned in order to remove the contagion from the community. So the wench hunt did not end with Flotta's death. Hunt did not end with Flotta's death. The hunts continued for 10 years and it is estimated that between 800 and 1,000 people were executed for witchcraft in the electorate of Trier.
Speaker 1:The prince-elector became concerned about the fact that the trials had gone on for so long and that men and members of the social and political elites were being accused. In 1591, he issues an order concerning witch-hunting committees to try and rein in their activities, but not to end their activities. He mainly wanted to bring them under the control of representatives of the government. However, he wasn't particularly particularly successful in that. Yeah, now, things eased in the 1590s as the pressures on the economies died down right. Weather started getting a little better, crops didn't die as much, there's less bad things to blame Less bad things, yes.
Speaker 1:However, it's important to note, of course, that the belief was still there, right, and there were still going to be witch hunts all around Europe. So the witch I keep saying winch. The witch hunts of Trier, of course, influenced other witch hunts. Again, this is the age of the printing press, so all kinds of printed material on the subject would be spread widely and translated into numerous languages. This is really important, mainly because it is the beginning of the witch hunts, because it is the beginning of the witch hunts. Now we're going to go a little more than a century into the future, and we're going to go to the Americas, specifically to Salem, massachusetts.
Speaker 1:So Salem was a small Puritan village in Massachusetts. Puritans were a dissenting sect of the Anglican church who fled England in the early 1600s. Of course, there's a little bit, it's a little bit more complicated and stuff than that, but that's all you really need to understand. So Salem, though, was a congregation-less church, meaning that the people there have a belief that the congregation itself should be able to shape how the church works. So they have the power to elect a new minister to lead their congregation, and they nominate Samuel Parris, who arrives in Salem in 1589 from Barbados. Salem Village, which is where most of this is going to happen, was kind of an arm of Salem town, and here's where we get some classism coming in.
Speaker 2:So, samuel, Parrish, parrish or Parris Parris. Like Perry, was he like a slave owner?
Speaker 1:They didn't say but hang on, salem Village was kind of an arm of Salem Town and Salem Town is going to be the more prosperous of the communities. They are fancier and they are adopting the more refined things, and these are going to be things that Puritans generally tend to stick their noses up at Right. So they are seen by some as being less godly than their Puritan neighbors in Salem Village, less godly than there are Puritan neighbors in Salem Village. Salem Village is fractious and is not really the place for an ambitious minister like Paris. He immediately begins to pull the godliest people around him to join his special congregation of pious villagers. To join his special congregation of pious villagers, paris gives very impassioned speeches and he wants to prove himself and his utility.
Speaker 1:Then, in January 1692, a bunch of children have been experimenting with magic. Specifically, they were doing something known as the egg and glass. So that is where you take the white of the egg and drip it into a glass or bowl of water and look at the shapes it makes. You would then ask God what shape your future would take and you would see it in the egg white.
Speaker 1:See it in the egg white. So these girls see a shape of a coffin and they begin to feel worried. After all, this kind of divination was believed to be demonic. It's unknown if Paris's daughter and niece, Betty and Abigail, actually took part in the rituals, but shortly afterwards Betty starts showing strange symptoms of what is often referred to as affliction.
Speaker 2:That's all. They call it a ritual and it's like, just like middle school girl shit yep, this affliction spreads to abigail.
Speaker 1:first the girls say their muscles hurt and then they start screaming. Paris calls the doctor who says I don't know, can't figure it out. Dude must be supernatural, and by supernatural he means of course witchcraft. It's not out of the blue. I mean there is precedence. There had been many cases in Europe of bewitchment and the girl's symptoms seem to follow the model. Once it was accepted that it was bewitchment.
Speaker 2:Wait, what's the model? Do you have the model of like the symptoms of bewitchment?
Speaker 1:Yeah, the other young children who say they were bewitched had muscle aches and were screaming.
Speaker 2:So muscle aches and screaming is the model I mean. I'm sure there were other things.
Speaker 1:I'm sure there were other things, but what I said it's not like period cramps. I mean, that's what I would go with.
Speaker 1:But yeah but I mean when I say screaming I don't just mean like they're like groaning, I think it means like it was terrifying screaming. Um, there's some other things they start to start to do. Once it was accepted that it was bewitchment, the adults asked the girls who caused their illness, and the girls accused three women, sarah Good and Sarah Osborne, who are two middle-aged women who are unpopular in the community, and of course Tituba. And of course Tituba, paris's servant, originally from South America. Now, possibly she was a slave. She was probably a slave at some point in her life.
Speaker 1:She's described sometimes as being a Black woman and sometimes as an indigenous woman. Yeah, so either way, both indigenous people and black people were enslaved at this time. Yeah, or she could have been both. Then the Putnam family began to show symptoms. Now, the Putmans were close family friends of the Parrises and they also accused the same women as Betty and Abigail. Damn it, betty Yep, in March of 1692,. The accused are brought into the magistrate and a confession, of course, is needed before they're sent to trial. Tituba begins by denying the accusations, but of course she is a woman of color in a room full of white men.
Speaker 2:So of course they're not going to believe a damn word.
Speaker 1:she says Right and they're already going to be predisposed to believe she is a witch. Predisposed to believe she is a witch. During the questioning she does eventually say that she hurt the children. She said the devil came to her and said she must hurt the children. She said the devil threatened to kill her, to tear her to pieces, to behead her. The magistrates then question the Sarahs and while they're questioning the women, they also question Sarah Good's daughter, dorothy, about her mother being a witch. Dorothy was four years old oh baby. She says her mother is a witch and then says that she is also a witch.
Speaker 2:Oh, no, yeah so the. No, yeah so the women.
Speaker 1:She's just a little baby. The women and Dorothy are sent off to Boston to await trial. They are kept in chains, and they are kept there for months before their trial. It turns out that Boston's charter has expired. It turns out that Boston's charter has expired, and so they have to. The governor and some other dudes have to go to England to renew the charter. Since the governor has gone to England to get this new charter, it's legal, legal. It needs the charter, so the legal process can still function. So, because the charter is expired and because the governor is no longer in massachusetts, they can't hold a trial for the accused until the governor returns. And of course, this is 1692, so it's going to be a bit yeah.
Speaker 1:Those months, though, give time for the afflictions to spread and for community concerns to grow. Questions can still be asked of suspects, and the imprisoned women begin to mention others who might be involved. There's no mention of torture of these women, not in this account or any of the accounts I've read, but jail at this point in time still would have been a horrendous place to be, so you would probably agree or say anything Right. Months pass, and the villagers become more and more convinced that there are witches amongst them, and the girls make further accusations. And on top of that you have paris, who's already kind of inflammatory preacher, preaching even more about witchcraft to his congregation. Obviously his daughter and niece are afflicted, and during all of this more girls become afflicted.
Speaker 1:And during all of this, more girls become afflicted. The imprisoned women keep-.
Speaker 2:Are they going to imprison all the women in the town?
Speaker 1:The imprisoned women keep getting questions and they keep telling stories of the witchcraft they committed and they name other people in the village. And these new people name other people. Paris asks the previous minister to come and see what he thinks he visits and one of the girls starts running around the room screaming, tries to open the window and fly out. He writes an account, which then lends credence to the accusation. So now you don't just have young girls doing things, but you have an established person that is respected within their community, that is giving credence to the accusations. So at first, those accused are, of course, going to be the outsiders, the people who are not popular within the village. There are people who are different, who go against the norm, who are generally disliked. Right, sarah Good was homeless. Was she a?
Speaker 2:widow.
Speaker 1:I can't remember. I'm sure she was so pretty much if you stepped outside of the norms at all and you were a woman especially. God help you. So as time goes on, though, more prominent people are accused, like Rebecca Nurse, who is really a very big surprise because she's well-known and well-respected in the village and she's also seen as being a very good and pious person. Like if you lined up all the people in the village and said, pick out the witches, she would be one of the last people you would pick.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Right. So it's kind of a surprise to folks. So we have the class division between Salem Village and Salem Town, which kind of also has a religious divide, or at least one thinks they're more religious than the other. Then we have Paris, who really intensifies the fractions and resentments between the village and the town. And then on top of that you've got division in salem village between the putnams and the porters, who are both prominent families, uh, but both families living in the village, not the town, uh.
Speaker 2:So the putnams, and, sorry if I'm mistaken, the village is the one that's the more like stringent side they think that they're better and they're also poorer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yes, the porters and their allies are politically linked to Salem Town. The Putnams are more linked to Paris and much more old-fashioned in their emphasis on Puritan godliness. Godliness the accused tended to come from the porter network, while the afflicted were more closely linked to the paris putnam faction.
Speaker 1:On top of that, we have fear of the dispossessed indigenous peoples. Of course they've been kicked off their land. There's famine. So here's an issue I had kind of with the video they go. The scholar was like they don't know how to grow their crops anymore because the indigenous people aren't helping them, which fair, but I mean they've been there for several decades. So yeah, they do. And second, it's the little ice age. That's why they're having a famine. Whatever, either they're having a famine because they don't know what crops to grow or they're having a famine because of bad weather have you seen the horror film the witch?
Speaker 2:no, it really showcases like like religious extremism and I think it me. One of the things I really enjoy about it is it kind of showcases the horror of Puritanism. There's a scene where their baby is missing and they're searching. The father and his son are searching in the woods, they're looking for the baby and his like son are like searching in the woods. They're like looking for the baby and like the, the son is like asking the father like if the baby will go to heaven and like the father cannot tell him that the baby will go to heaven, right?
Speaker 1:yeah and to me I'm like that's horrifying, yeah you know, and anyway it's really good it had to be terrifying to be a Puritan I try to bring this up to my students all the time is that you did not know if you were going to go to heaven or hell, and hell was a very real and terrifying place to Puritans, to everybody at the time, but especially to Puritans, in a way that it isn't really to us, to everybody at the time, but especially to Puritans in a way that it isn't really to us.
Speaker 2:I mean to believers today. Yes, it's a real place, but the difference is just astronomically different. The punishment that they're putting themselves through every moment so that they can be worthy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you didn't know if you were going to heaven or hell, but you had to live your life as if you were going to heaven and every little thing you did could be considered a sin. Yeah, it's very terrifying. And then I also have to emphasize to my students that this is the new world, like it's only been I don't know six or seven decades since there's been Europeans, english Europeans, in this part of town, in this part of the country, and so like nothing is built up.
Speaker 1:The woods are deep and dark and thick and you are surrounded by tribes of indigenous people who are not really wanting to be your friend because you have been dicks to them I mean legit, Legit been dicks to them and they legitimately have a reason to dislike you. But you're also constantly terrified of your town being invaded because there are rumors of that happening. Plus, there is actually a war. There are predatory animals as well, Like you can like. There are literally wolves right outside your window, you know, and there are.
Speaker 1:There is a war, as I wrote down here, just to the north of them, Right? So I mean, this is a scary, scary, scary time and place to live. And, on top of all the real world things, you have all of those supernatural beliefs, Like it's not like God's up in heaven somewhere and just hanging out and you know the devil's in hell somewhere hanging out Like it's in your face, it's visceral and like at any second you could either be a victim or fall. Pray to the devil. Yeah, you know, and you just don't know I mean, what was like?
Speaker 2:anxiety and stress, saying about whatever life is, whatever lonely, horrible, whatever nasty bird is short, I forget exactly, but like yeah, I mean that is what life was like. Yeah, it was really horrible and it was really hard and yeah, and it was short and, like there was disease, there were people trying to kill you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there was animals trying to kill you, yeah people didn't know what to eat.
Speaker 2:They would eat like poison, fucking plants and yeah, like yeah and yeah.
Speaker 1:So it's just you were, if you were so, adding all of the the real world things, adding on top of that that you're a puritan and so you're in constant fear of your soul's damnation, your eternal damnation, you must have been riddled with anxiety and fear 24 7.
Speaker 1:So it's kind of like no wonder this shit happened you know, um, okay, so anyway, there was a war to the north and so some of the accusers were probably refugees. Weirdly, not the accused, but the accusers were refugees. All of these factors are feeding into the division in Salem and perpetuating this mood of suspicion. Between January and May, there are 81 people accused of witchcraft, 49 of them are imprisoned witchcraft 49 of them are imprisoned. Then the governor arrives back in massachusetts with a new charter and therefore the courts can open up. He is a bit busy though. He's got war and shit to deal with, so he doesn't directly deal with the accusations coming out of sal, but he does open a court to deal especially with the accused, the imprisoned. It's called the Court of Oyer and Terminer.
Speaker 1:In June of 1692, the trials were held in the meeting house in Salem Town. So it's church, basically, and it's packed, it's noisy and it's hot and the accused have to defend themselves. They do not have lawyers. And then on top of that, they insist that the afflicted be brought in. And so they're brought in as a group. These uh, children and pre-teen teenage girls, uh, you know, like writhing and whimpering and babbling and they have fits and they make new accusations while they're sitting there. They'd say things like she's attacking me, she's hitting me, any time that the accused moved even a little bit.
Speaker 1:Those who confessed tended to be seen as remorseful. But even if they confessed so their lives would be saved if they confessed yeah. However, they would be publicly tainted, meaning their lives are never going to be back to normal. They will always be an outcast. They will be judged guilty and again, but not executed. Tituba is brought in and brings up the idea that there is a network of witches all working together. She was found guilty and jailed and as people are accused and confess which again confessing spares them the number of suspects and convicted witches grows, right. I mean, the people are smart, they see this, they're in court, they're like oh, she confessed, got spared, I'm accused, I'm going to confess and get spared, right, and I'll just point the finger at somebody else. Then the court admits spectral evidence, which is evidence based on the visions of the accusers. So it's based on the idea that the devil has the power to cause hallucinations in people's minds. So evidence not visible to spect but is visible to the accusers are admissible and you can't disprove it. Seems legit, yeah.
Speaker 2:Again, we should definitely have some modern trials based on this kind of evidence. Oh yeah, it seems very sound, it sure does Again.
Speaker 1:Those who confess are jailed but are spared execution, and the first person to be found guilty is Bridget Bishop, who pled not guilty. She was condemned to die. You're sitting here taking a selfie. I think you are a bit drunk. I better be after two of these. The first person to be found guilty is bridget bishop because she pled not guilty. She was condemned to die but maintained her innocence all the way to the gallows and she was hanged, and it should be noted. The main reason people bring up Bridget Bishop, at least in this particular episode, is because so, generally speaking, whether you were guilty or not and you were to be executed, you were supposed to look contrite and remorseful.
Speaker 1:Bridget bishop was like fuck that yeah and um, it freaked people out and that day a judge resigns. So things are not going well right. June 29th, sarah good is brought in with four other women, including rebecca nurse. All five women are found guilty and sentenced to death. They are executed on july 19th. Reportedly, sarah good, upon being asked by the assistant minister to confess to save her soul, while she's on the gallows, she turned on him and the crowd and the judges and said You're a liar, I'm no more a witch than you are a wizard, and if you take my life away, god will give you blood to drink. So at this point, in case you keep in score, six women have been executed.
Speaker 1:And then Cotton Mather gets involved. Sort of, he was a well respected senior minister, a university intellectual, and was considered an authority on witches. He and other respected ministers hear about this shit going down in salem and they hear about spectral evidence. And so they write to the court and basically say look, dudes, the spectral evidence stuff use extreme caution. Don't want to tell you what to do, but, like you know, maybe chill a little, right, but keep doing what you're doing. So, uh, because of cotton mathers kind of questioning things a little bit, we start to get some people also beginning to question things and questioning why the accusers were accusing who they were accusing Right, and so this is the beginning of some doubt about the validity of the testimony of spectral evidence. No, no, I know, how dare they. That was my favorite kind of evidence.
Speaker 1:Right August 19th, another five people are hanged, including a former minister of Salem, george Burroughs. He was Paris's predecessor and he is said to have given a really impassioned speech which he closes and this is most important with a perfect recitation of the Lord's Prayer. So this is one of those tests that they would generally give to witches, because there was a stereotype that a witch couldn't get through the Lord's Prayer without tripping up at some point. So the fact that George Burroughs could give a perfect recitation.
Speaker 2:Well, he's a priest?
Speaker 1:Of course he can Well, yeah, but he's supposed to be a witch, yeah, so a witch wouldn't be able to. They physically wouldn't be able to, because they're not godly enough.
Speaker 2:Yes, but of course that's nonsense.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, excuse me, it's important that he is able to do that.
Speaker 2:Well, did they say oh my gosh, obviously this man is not a witch, no, just wait.
Speaker 1:So this is going to create some doubts to some of the onlookers and the crowd starts to almost riot and they shout for the execution to be stopped Because obviously they must have made a mistake. A witch would not be able to say the lord's perfectly. But cotton mather, who's there hanging out wanting to watch all these executions? Uh, he lectures the crowd, in which he says these people are indeed witches and there's nothing wrong with the ex, with, uh, the judgment and the execution should continue. Well, that tears it. Well it does. The crowd is like oh well, it's caught, mather, let's we accept your authority and the executions proceed. And now we're at 11 dead.
Speaker 1:As doubts grow, some villagers start to take a stand, but that proves deadly. One such person was Giles Gorey. He refused to make a plea at his trial, so he doesn't plead guilty or not guilty At this point in time. If a person refused to plead, they could be subjected to torture to compel them to do so. From September 18th to 19th he is laid out and a board is put on top of him and they place what is said in the documentary is heavy weights, but it's actually like really heavy stones.
Speaker 2:Is that that badass? More weight dude? Yes, so he, that dude, is my low key hero.
Speaker 1:So he has heavy, heavy, heavy stones piled on top of him and he is essentially suffocated to death. Yeah, crushed to death as well, I would say yeah, crushed to death as well. I would say he reportedly is said to have said, when asked what he had to say to the court, he's reported to have said more weight, mr Corey, real king shit. Yeah, mr Corey has his revenge, though sort of because, because he didn't confess and wasn't found guilty, his estate went to his son-in-laws instead of the authorities, and also not that it uh does anything, but because he did not plea and he did not have a trial, his execution was unlawful didn't stop anybody consequence?
Speaker 1:no, of course not. But I mean, yeah, there would be questions. I would think so. Uh, we've skipped a few people, but now we're at 16 dead. So just days after giles cory's death, his wife, martha, was found guilty of witchcraft and hung of. Of course, again, we skip a few more people. Witchcraft is obviously a family affair. Of course we skip a few more people and end on September 22, 1692, with 20 executed In just seven months. I shouldn't say just seven months.
Speaker 1:In seven months, 185 people were accused, 59 went to trial, 19 were hanged, one was pressed to death. A number of others died in prison, including an infant that one of the Sarahs had while in prison Aw, baby. So Dorothy, sarah Good's little girl, who had said that both she and Sarah were a witch, is said to have gone insane by the time she was allowed out of prison at age five. Is said to have gone insane by the time she was allowed out of prison at age five. And it doesn't end in Salem. All over Massachusetts, including in Boston, people were being accused of witchcraft. The witch hunts also spread across New England and they continue to attract the attention of religious experts, including Increase Mather, father of Cotton. Mather. Increase. Mather writes a letter to express some of his doubts and says that maybe some of the evidence and accusations don't really carry the weight they did His father's name was Increase.
Speaker 2:Yes, we think that today's names are bad. I know, and some of them are, but I'm just saying that Increase is not a great name.
Speaker 1:No, so Increase calls on the governor to come back from wherever he is to sort things out. The governor really respects Increase Mather, and what he reads in the letter disturbs him. And there's also a rumor that someone has accused the governor's wife of being a witch. Can't have that. So in other words, he's got at least one good reason to end the crisis immediately. Yeah, and on october 29th, the governor believes public opinion has shifted enough to call a halt to the proceedings and dismantles the court. The people in jail are freed, and that includes Tituba. Paris feels he's failed as a minister. Oh, tituba gets free. Yeah, nice, paris feels he's failed as a minister. Families of some of the Suck it Paris, families of some of the executed, actually managed to get him out of the village and out of his ministry. As for Salem itself, the community is left with neighbors who are not speaking to each other. Yeah, I bet.
Speaker 1:The church structure has fallen apart and the support swings towards the family of the accused rather than the accusers. Obviously, salem has changed forever. In 1697, the general courts orders a day of prayer and fasting to reflect back on the witch trials, and maybe the same year one of the judges writes a public apology for his role in the trials. In 1752, salem rebrands itself it is now called Danvers, which caused division and friction in the community. And then, in the 20th century, the Salem Witch Trials are revisited. In 1957, the state of Massachusetts apologizes for the trials. And a lot of this and the interest in the Salem Witch Trials partly happened because of the play the Crucible, which is, yes, technically about the Salem witch trials but is also about a more modern witch hunt the Joseph McCarthy-led anti-communist crusade.
Speaker 2:I have seen the crucible, but a long time ago, when I was like I was like a freshman, I think in high school. I think I saw it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, historians have been trying ever since to explain the Salem witch trials, and the explanations run from the girls were simply awful. They were lying and they knew full well what they were doing. So that's one end, and it goes all the way to things like the ergot fungus, to mass hysteria. And while the girls have some culpability, putting the blame on them removes it from the men who led the trials and gave the judgments, as one scholar says. That's not me saying, it, that's a. I forget the scholar's name, though I didn't write it down. They of course, were the actual adults in the room and they had way more power than the girls did I mean, even if they come you know some kids come to you with a bullshit story.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's your job as an adult to be like okay, sweetie run along now instead of being like oh my god, this is a really serious situation. Yeah, time to put a bunch of women on trial.
Speaker 1:Yeah like but I mean, of course, we. We have to remember, though, that they really believe this stuff. Yeah, to them it's gonna. It's a real tangible, terrifying thing, and it was their duty as good christians to weed it out, and they would have no reason not to disbelieve the girls, since there was already precedence for what was happening to them very true.
Speaker 1:We talk about living in whatever like a post-fact environment or whatever, and this was like a pre-fact right they had there's no science, there's no, uh, people don't know why they're sick, they don't know why the crops are. I mean, they really only have supernatural explanations. Right, which is going to be the bible, and and the witch and witchcraft, and thou shalt not suffer a witch to live I mean I wouldn't say that the girls have no culpability.
Speaker 2:Obviously they do have some.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I agree.
Speaker 2:At the same time, yeah, there is definitely a point that they are not adults. They don't have mature brains.
Speaker 1:No, and they're not the ones who called the courts and stuff. So, no, the blame should not be fully put on them. It should be put on, I think, sexism, religious fanaticism, yep, and lack of science, yeah, yep, okay, so is that all we have? We talked a lot about it during the thing, so is there anything else we want to say?
Speaker 2:About witch trials Any.
Speaker 1:Yeah, a lot about it during the thing. So is there anything else we want to say About witch trials? Any?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I guess. So About the crime. Oh my God, shit, bullshit.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's bullshit for sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it is interesting. I do think you have a point right when things are going bad right. If you do think you have a point right when things are going bad right, then we seem to have this human tendency to want to blame somebody for it, and that hasn't gone away.
Speaker 1:No, it hasn't. We find scapegoats all the time.
Speaker 2:Yep Mm-hmm and you know Communists.
Speaker 1:Jews whatever you know, you can put it on anybody you want Immigrants trans people trans people gay people, women, yep.
Speaker 2:So it's easy to be like, oh look at those idiots. But yeah, even with this level of information, even with scientific information yeah, you know, with cognitive dissidence, right, and such people's opinions are difficult to shift they don't want to shift. Yeah, and I think, right, the studies show a little tipsy. So if I'm not making a really good point, yeah, that they just kind of mentally make up an excuse that that information is not good.
Speaker 1:Have you read or watched anything this week?
Speaker 2:So I just watched Deep Space Nine. I've been meaning to watch like some horror movies, like I want to watch some horror movies, but I just haven't had the energy. I've still been sick, yeah, and yeah, I have gotten more energy the past few days, yeah, although now I'm like super congested, yeah, and so it's like I I couldn't talk for like five days or something.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like I had no voice, yeah, and now I'm finally getting my voice back, although I still have a bit of this like spasmy cough. And now it's like today, all of a sudden I have this new symptom of congestion and it's like what the fuck? Yeah, because I've been having some kind of like cold and flu symptoms for like the past 20 days and it almost seems like one symptom at a time.
Speaker 2:It's like you're going to enjoy like one symptom at a time for like four or five days, and then you're going to have a new symptom, kind of. Thing which is really fucking awful, and I just wish it would end. I have I read nestlings. I read uh, let's see what else I read that we I don't know what did we talk about last time when we talked about the ray rivera book? That's because I talked about yeah, yeah, um, I read the terror. Did we talk about that?
Speaker 2:we didn't talk about anything separate it did not have yetis in it. Oh, that blows. Yeah, apparently the the one that is supposed to be yeti-ish is is another arctic book. Apparently dan simmons has multiple arctic books called abominable. But I accidentally read a spoiler. But I'm kind of glad that I read it. That's not actually yetis so no and I read that it's. It's not as good as the terror and it doesn't actually have yetis in it, so I'm not gonna bother oh yeah, so I finished the girl who could move shit with her mind.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I told you that I was pretty. I finished the Girl who Could Move Shit With Her Mind. I told you that I was pretty disappointed in that one, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I dumped it after a few pages.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it very much gives kind of two-dimensional girl character written by a dude yeah, written by a dude, yeah. So yeah, I read Horrid by Katrina Lino, so that was pretty interesting. I was felt like the ending was a bit anticlimactic, uh-huh. And I read Nestlings by. Matt Cassidy, which was quite enjoyable. Nice. Yeah, you said you did like it. Yes, I did like it, so I gave it a four. I would say 4.5. Yeah.
Speaker 2:So, maybe I should have given it a five, but I don't know. I never know how to go, whether or not I should like rate up or rate down. Yeah, so I rated it down. Maybe that was not fair, but I really wish they would give me ten. Half stars yeah half stars or ten stars, so that I could give it a more nuanced reading.
Speaker 1:Yeah, come on, goodreads, get with the program. Five is not enough.
Speaker 2:That's what I'm doing, and I guess I will say that I have tentatively started. David Copperfield.
Speaker 1:I think that's the book I'm taking on my trip because I'm not going to have time this week. Right, I have to read the luminaries.
Speaker 2:I have to read the luminaries. It has been a bit hard to focus when there's very loud children yeah, yelling and jumping around, yeah.
Speaker 1:And it's Dickens, so it's not like you can just.
Speaker 2:Exactly, you got to focus, yeah. Yeah. That's why, like I had started it and then like I had like Betty, and then I had Betty was jumping on the bed and she was yelling and I'm like I'm switching to an easier book. And then I put on Nestlings. But I was enjoying it. I was like this is pretty good so far, but I was like I just cannot.
Speaker 1:Well, we can take our time with it. Because I may not take it? I don't know that I really want to be reading Dickens on a cruise. Yeah, To the Bahamas. I mean, you'll look really sophisticated.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't want to, though I'm already going to be dealing with some gloomy things, since it's a true crime thing. Yeah, yeah thing. So very true. I have been reading can you on one of those shelves with like kind of where your arm is at? Yeah, there is diana gabaldon and it's like lord john and something. Lord john, by diana gabaldon, that series is, um, what am I trying to say? Uh, so diana gabaldon obviously writes the outlander series, but she had a character in one of the outlander books called lord john and he became somewhat popular, and so now she has a mystery series involving lord john's, who is a gay guy in the 1700s 1700s england in the military little mlm action uh, yeah not, not multi-level marketing, no but,
Speaker 1:um so he and he kind of has a thing for jamie frazier, who's the outlander. Well, I mean, the lady is the outlander, but he's the dude in the Outlander series. Anyway, these are mystery series. They're really fun. Lord John is a fun dude. They're well written and it's very absorbing into that time period and all of that stuff. So if you like historical books, it's fun. But he's a fun character and he is. I don't know if it's that one or a different one, but I'm currently reading it audiobook in the car. I really enjoy the audiobooks. He likes the MLM action, the men love men action. Yeah, he usually doesn't get any though. Oh okay, he wants it.
Speaker 1:He doesn't always get it eventually right.
Speaker 2:Is there like? Is that so? Is that other dude you mentioned? Is that his like main love interest?
Speaker 1:well, he has a huge crush on him, but jamie frazier's not a fan and not a fan and jamie frazier's in fuck jamie frazier then, Well, he's the main dude in the Outlander series so he's got his lady love.
Speaker 2:I see, Plus, he's a I don't even know these characters and I'm already standing the protagonist.
Speaker 1:Well, the problem is history right, so Jamie Frazier is a Scottish Jacobite.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And Lord John is a British military military man so not frenzies yeah not frenzies, but lord john definitely wants to get up jamie's skirt.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so to speak, nice yeah, I've heard that people like the romantic lead in outlander. Yeah, he's. I don't know too much about outlander, but I've he's a sweetie. I've only I've only read the first one I've heard people like swoon, like oh, outlander, and all this dude character.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and the show's. The show's good too. Yeah. Yeah, I mean there's jamie frazier nude. It's not hard not to like. You've got a bunch of dudes and kilts, yeah I do like a kilt good looking dudes and kilts for all genders yes, um, yeah, no, it's a fun series.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've only read the, the one actually. I think I've only actually read half of the outlander book. I've seen the full first season of outlander. It's about a woman in the post-world war ii who's married and I forget what happens. But basically she gets put back in time and right falls in love with jamie, who is a younger man speve kilt.
Speaker 2:So that reminds me of how you told me that you watch timeline for gerard butler yes, I did. I did watch timeline for gerard butler still occasionally do, uh like jay and I had like been like we're at a hotel and we were like flipping through the channels.
Speaker 1:We saw this like very terrible rom-com so you saw a terrible rom-com with him in it. Is it the one with? Is it the one with, um? Katherine heigl?
Speaker 2:no, it wasn't that one no although that scene was a different terrible rom-com with gerard butler. Although prompting seeing that one, we watched some of it and it was. It was so bad. And jay was like why are we even watching this? And I was like I don't know, it's got gerard butler. I was like he used to be like you know this, like really handsome leading man, like yeah, you know. And jay was like he's all right and I was like I was like well, he's aged a bit.
Speaker 2:You know he's still handsome, but like I was, like you know, he used to be quite popular. Yeah, um, and then I, I told them about the, the, the terrible katherine heigl one with the, the vibrator, in their restaurant yeah and they were like no, that's not real. I was like it totally is real, yeah, um the vibrating panties yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:so when you mentioned that about timeline, then made me think about that terrible rom-com and uh, yeah, by the time he got into the rom-coms he was fit, though Like 300 on he was real fit. I liked him in time lengths he had more of a dad bod.
Speaker 2:I completely forgot that he was in 300. Yeah, he was the main dude in 300. I should have. I should have mentioned 300. Cause I mentioned timeline as well, and I should have mentioned 300, because I mentioned Timeline as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and Jay was like I don't know what the fuck that is, I don't know what that means. Yeah, yeah, no, I liked him with his I'm like hello Michael Crichton. Right, I loved him in his dad bod era.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Who doesn't love a dad bod yeah.
Speaker 1:Older man, yeah um older man.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, I, I think he's still cute. Oh, he still is. Yeah, I still, I still like him even now. But no, but this movie was, is was quite atrocious. Yeah, um, I mean, I think we need I need a petition for more dad bods yeah you know um well, they are becoming more popular.
Speaker 1:Pedro, pascal yeah, daddy pascal, zaddy, zaddy. Is he a zaddy or just a daddy?
Speaker 2:what the fuck is the difference between a zaddy and a daddy? A zaddy is better dressed. Oh, I just like the term zaddy better because, like Daddy, creeps me out a little bit. Yeah, okay, I am a millennial.
Speaker 1:Millennials like Daddy. We're the ones who brought that back, not me. Or brought it back, brought it out.
Speaker 2:Not me, but I'm like I can live with Zaddy. Yeah, that's different enough.
Speaker 1:Okay, so I didn't read or watch anything this week. I had to do Title IX training, that's exciting.
Speaker 2:How did that go? It went, it's the same thing. Different semester yeah, you have to do it every semester, not every like year.
Speaker 1:I think it might be every year, I can't remember. But I'm going to have to do a second one for a different school, so when I was a sub. We had to do it yeah every year, yeah, yeah um, okay, so our book, which will be next episode, is long haul hunting the highway serial killers is Long Haul Hunting the Highway Serial Killers by Frank Figliuzzi.
Speaker 2:And we're going to read it by next week. Apparently, we're going to get on it and you're also going to read your own 800-page. There's just some luminaries.
Speaker 1:Thanks book club for picking that 800-page one. No, it's okay, it actually sounds like a really enjoyable yeah I just need to, and it's not like I haven't had a month to fucking read it. Yeah, I just haven't read it, yeah, happens. Yeah, it's been happening for a year and a half, two years almost everybody goes through slums.
Speaker 2:That's true. That's true.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, that's it, I think I think so, so um like, subscribe, download. Send us an email review. Send an email. Follow us us on our instagrams and facebook.
Speaker 2:Anybody who uh called a governor greg abbott or uh, yeah, uh assisted um with uh robert roberson's, uh assisted in getting a stay of execution for him, so that was really awesome. Yes, yeah, we appreciate you we appreciate you.
Speaker 1:Yes, and happy Halloween. Yep, yeah, happy Halloween, and we will Don't eat too much candy no.
Speaker 2:Don't eat none candy, unless you can't.
Speaker 1:I will be eating all the candy. I don't think we're handing any out. I think I'm just going to be eating. Well, I will be in El Paso on my way to.
Speaker 2:Miami for the cruise. You don't have to hand out any of your candy.
Speaker 1:No, it's very exciting. Okay, so like, subscribe, review, download, follow us on the Instas and stuff, stuff, and we will talk to you next time. Bye.
