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Shh.
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Commentator or Main Speaker
America pretty much invented slavery. It's our original sin. It's one more thing. Armstrong and Getty. One more Thing if anybody's in the market for a big steaming pile of horse crap. That introduction. That introduction was one. Introduction isn't a word. Introduction.
Co-host or Producer
I was gonna say I sent sarcasm.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Steaming pile of horse manure.
Guest or Panelist
That reminds me, I had a friend who regularly used the expression, we were always out at the bar and stuff like that. And he had this job. He didn't like his boss, and he was always talking about, and what do they give me here? Here's a shit sandwich, son.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Eat up. He'd always say that. Wow.
Jacob Goldstein (Ad Voice)
Wow.
Commentator or Main Speaker
You know, I'll just go ahead and grab something from the vending machine and nobody wants that. Right?
Guest or Panelist
Right.
Commentator or Main Speaker
So you got John Stossel here. The great John Stossel. And. And he's talking mustache. Mustache before, mustache was cool, and mustache after, it's no longer cool. He is the OG Stash guy. Anyway, talking to Wilford Riley, I don't remember if he introduces him in any of our clips, but he wrote a great book that I own called Lies My Liberal Teacher Told Me, or Progressive Teacher, whatever it is. And then Brett pike, who you may or may not know, he is a real guru in, like, traditional patriotic education and homeschooling and that sort of thing. And they kind of meld together pretty well. Thanks to Hanson for editing some of this. But anyway, let's just start, Michael with clip number 90. We'll go from there. This is John Stossel.
John Stossel (Clip Speaker)
The Original sin of Slavery.
Guest or Panelist
The original sin of slavery.
John Stossel (Clip Speaker)
Today, Americans are taught when it comes to slavery, America was the worst.
Podcast Host
The Atlantic slave trade from Africa to the Americas was different from any other type of slavery.
Commentator or Main Speaker
The United States didn't inherit slavery from anybody. We created it.
John Stossel (Clip Speaker)
American slavery was worse because the slaves.
Guest or Panelist
Were reduced to property. They were channel property. No other system of slavery did that except American slavery.
Commentator or Main Speaker
As we're about to hear, virtually everything that you just heard is completely fictional.
Guest or Panelist
Boy, some of them were really howlers.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Yeah. Oh, yeah. Absolutely true. But they're necessary to convince kids to hate their country so the neo Marxists can take it over.
Guest or Panelist
Now.
Commentator or Main Speaker
There are a lot of useful idiots that don't understand that's what they're doing, but they're part of it nonetheless. Roll on.
Wilfred Riley (Clip Speaker)
That's complete nonsense.
John Stossel (Clip Speaker)
Wilfred Riley is a political science professor and author of Lies My liberal Teacher Told Me.
Wilfred Riley (Clip Speaker)
Generational slavery. Like, if you're the son of a slave, you're a slave. That was extraordinarily common. Slavery around the world was slavery.
John Stossel (Clip Speaker)
Books like this Unfinished Nation. Slaves in Africa were kept unfree only.
Wilfred Riley (Clip Speaker)
For A fixed term no is the short answer. Most of the slaves taken by these sort of players would be either kept as slaves for their entire life or more likely, sold to the whites and the Arabs in two years.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Okay, we can roll on.
John Stossel (Clip Speaker)
Today, partly thanks to the New York Times 1619 project, students are taught that America's slavery was unlike anything that existed before.
Wilfred Riley (Clip Speaker)
We're the worst society ever. We've done things that no one else has ever done. And sometimes there's nothing wrong with acknowledging your historical mistakes. I mean, I'm black, Irish, a bit Native American, at least per the family lore. I mean, those are three peoples that have experienced a great deal historically. Nothing wrong with acknowledging that. But it's extremely odd to focus only on the negatives of your society and to exaggerate those.
Guest or Panelist
Yeah, I'd say, as I've been saying for a long time.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Yeah, it's for a specific purpose, as I've been saying for a long time. Roll on.
John Stossel (Clip Speaker)
Americans are taught that slavers caught people in Africa and shipped them here. But few were taught that most slaves were not shipped to the United States.
Wilfred Riley (Clip Speaker)
Between 10.7 million and 12 million slaves from Africa went to the New World. We got a little under 400,000.
John Stossel (Clip Speaker)
Under 400,000 out of 10 million.
Wilfred Riley (Clip Speaker)
The extreme focus on slavery in the United States, why did that happen? One reason is that a lot of black people survived here. Slavery was harsh, but it's a lot less harsh than clearing the Brazilian jungle.
Commentator or Main Speaker
So out of. And Stossel just went with 10 million. But as Mr. Riley put it, it was 10.7 to 12 million slaves out of. We'll call it 11 million. Just split the difference. Out of 11 million, we got about 400,000.
Guest or Panelist
And the rest went where? South America.
Commentator or Main Speaker
South America and Central America to a lesser extent. But, yeah.
Guest or Panelist
Wow, that is not well known.
Co-host or Producer
And the way it's talked about, you'd think it was all here, of course.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Every single person. Yeah, yeah.
Guest or Panelist
Or. Or that, you know. Or that it has never, never existed anywhere on earth before this. It's always existed.
Ski and Snowboard Insider Announcer
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Guest or Panelist
It's like maybe it's as old as prostitution. It's one of the oldest professions, owning another human being, if you're strong enough to grab them and force them to do it.
Commentator or Main Speaker
More on that to come, but you're both absolutely right. Roll on, Michael.
John Stossel (Clip Speaker)
All right. But American blacks are at a disadvantage. They have less capital, financial and educational capital. What's the harm in pointing out how abusive white people were?
Wilfred Riley (Clip Speaker)
The harm is that pointing out how abusive white people were is not going to get black Americans any more capital. Most of the problems of the modern black community don't have anything to do with historical ethnic conflict 160 years ago.
John Stossel (Clip Speaker)
Riley says most of the problems began when welfare began.
Wilfred Riley (Clip Speaker)
Crime in the black community, every time I've tried to break this out, increased about 800% between, say, 1963 and 1993. Racism didn't increase between 1960 and the modern era. You're looking at the impact of the Great Society, the welfare programs.
John Stossel (Clip Speaker)
Riley argues it's better to teach the truth that almost every society had slavery.
Commentator or Main Speaker
And then Brett pike kind of accidentally, sort of in these two clips that we're looking at, continues the story.
Brett Pike (Clip Speaker)
Why is it that public schools only teach about the transatlantic slave trade? They don't teach that there was slavery in the Ottoman Empire, that It lasted for 600 years and 5 to 10 million people were enslaved, that they not only enslaved men, but the most valuable slaves were women, because sexual slavery was not only permitted, but it was institutionalized in the Ottoman Empire. So they would get many of their slaves from central Europe, many of their slaves from the Balkans, and they would enslave Hungarians, Russians, Ukrainians, which is why the word slave comes from sloth.
Commentator or Main Speaker
As an aside, I happen to hear a different discussion about slavery in the Ottoman Empire and the Muslim world in general. And one of the real issues Islam had was when the slave trade was abolished, led by the English and Americans, among others. Fundamentalist Islam said, slavery is absolutely normal. In fact, it's Muhammad had slaves. This is something we do. And to back off of that is to be pushed off of Islam. And in some of the major battles in the 19th century where Muslim lands were conquered, some of the people who had to cooperate with the west said, all right, how do we convince people to just let the slavery thing go? And that was the beginning of what you might call the protestantization of certain aspects of Islam, where they started to push the idea that, well, the Quran says it, but what really matters is what's in your heart and your relationship with God.
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With an IFIT contract for $250,000.
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This is where mindset comes in.
Podcast Host
Someone will be eliminated.
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Podcast Host
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Watch it on prime video starting January 8th.
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Guest or Panelist
Also had it was just a couple weeks ago somebody had a stat higher than I'd ever heard before of the percentage of black slaves that were captured by other black people and then sold to the United States or South America or whatever.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Vast, vast majority.
Guest or Panelist
Yeah, yeah, it's like 90% or something.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Because slavery was routine in Africa. One tribe or people enslaving the other after beating them in a war. It was routine.
Guest or Panelist
Yes, Katie.
Brett Pike (Clip Speaker)
No, I'm just.
Co-host or Producer
This is. I mean, listening to this, all I'm thinking is like how it so doesn't work with Today's narrative.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Right.
Guest or Panelist
You're also younger than us and grew up in the Bay Area, so.
Co-host or Producer
Yeah. And I'm thinking about what I was taught in school, and it's like it was not this.
Wilfred Riley (Clip Speaker)
Yeah.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Right.
Guest or Panelist
We've been talking a lot about the book Dominion by Tom Holland lately, and he talks in there about how Julius Caesar went off to what would today be France, killed a million people and enslaved a million people. That's white people. Enslaving white people.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Million people.
Guest or Panelist
The advanced, you know, deep thinking Roman Empire.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Oh, yeah. Ancient Greeks. Yeah. Slavery was ubiquitous around the globe. Next clip.
Brett Pike (Clip Speaker)
And why don't schools teach about the trans Indian slave trade, which lasted for over 1200 years and enslaved 4 to 10 million people, or the trans Saharan slave trade, which lasted for over 1200 years and enslaved 9 to 17 million people, all of which ended ready for it, not before, but long after the North Atlantic slave trade. And yes, chattel slavery was practiced in all of these places. In fact, in 1776, the majority of countries in the world practiced chattel slavery. And where Europe and the United States were early in abolishing slavery, it went on much longer in the Middle east, in Africa, and in places like China, Thailand and Mongolia.
Guest or Panelist
Yeah, the. The icing on the cake being that China has slaves right now.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Right. Final clip.
Brett Pike (Clip Speaker)
If you went back to 1776, you would find 90 to 95% of the countries in the world practiced slavery, and that had been the norm for thousands of years. And the United States of America banned slavery in seven states when the rest of the world had only banned it in seven countries. And the reason this isn't taught is that everything in school is framed through a Marxist lens of oppressed versus oppressors. So they intentionally teach our history out of context, which is a form of brainwashing that is designed to make dividing and conquering society easy, because absent of historical context, it allows them to frame the United States of America as some uniquely evil place, when in reality it is Britain, the United States of America, and the west that is responsible for driving the institution of slavery into extinction.
Guest or Panelist
It's slavery obviously seems insane by modern standards that any human being could own another human being. But I wonder, throughout world history, what percentage of humans were slaves? But it's fairly high.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Or lived in countries where it was routine to have slaves, then you're getting near 100%.
Jacob Goldstein (Ad Voice)
Oof.
Guest or Panelist
What an awful life that many, many people in world history have lived. Toiling all day long for someone else's benefit.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Yeah, yeah, absolutely true. And slavery is Abhorrent. But it's the perversion of the story to undermine the United States that makes me sick and makes me mad. Full credit to John Stossel, Wilfred Riley and Brett pike for their absolutely great work on this. Keep going, fellas. We hope to. To spread your words by. By playing them here today.
Guest or Panelist
Decent chance, especially if you live in a blue state, blue city, that they're teaching the 1619 Project to your kids right here now.
Co-host or Producer
Yeah, that's. I mean, that's what's blowing my mind is, you know, high school for me was about 20 years ago and it, it. The classes obviously were slave heave heavy on how, you know, America bad. I can only imagine how bad it is now.
Guest or Panelist
Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's pretty much the only thing they teach in terms of American founding at this point. It's disturbing.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Well, and remember, they're supposed to work the whole critical theory thing into every class. Every class. Time to tear down government schools and start again.
Guest or Panelist
Gotta admit though, it'd be damn handy.
Commentator or Main Speaker
To have a slave.
Guest or Panelist
To have a slave. I saw Dave Chappelle talking about the other day in one of his comedy specials. It's true.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Mmm. I'm sure I want to go down that road, but the reason it existed.
Guest or Panelist
Forever is it'd be, damn, Andy, get an AI robot. Yeah, well, yeah, that's what we'll have that, that we finally get. It's all coming together. Took us a while. Nobody has to be abused. Well, certainly not their freedom denied. But we've got, you know, the upside right now would.
Commentator or Main Speaker
And this is the subject of some brilliant, brilliant science fiction through the years, would that robot obtain self awareness and desire liberty? Because liberty isn't. Is the natural state of man. From my point of view, though history would suggest otherwise.
Guest or Panelist
We might find out like by next.
Commentator or Main Speaker
June how that works out.
Co-host or Producer
God, I just watched a horror movie where an AI girlfriend robot goes on a rampage and just starts killing everybody.
Guest or Panelist
Why? What was she mad about? She.
Commentator or Main Speaker
She wouldn't say no if, you know, I'm gonna tear your arm off and beat you to death with your bloody stump.
Co-host or Producer
She somehow figured out that she was a robot and that everything that she believed was fake and that she just start.
Guest or Panelist
Made her angry.
Co-host or Producer
Made her angry. And then she teamed up with other robots.
Guest or Panelist
It was all bad.
Commentator or Main Speaker
That's straight out of some great Heinlein and Asimov and guys like that. Yeah, wow. But with more, you know, buckets of blood. Keep thinking about the time we talked about human footstools. Yeah, how convenient that would be. Anyway, in a lot of ways.
Guest or Panelist
Yeah.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Well, I guess that's it.
Jacob Goldstein (Ad Voice)
Shh.
Podcast Host
You won't believe what my new friend just told me about dinosaurs. Is your child having conversations you never imagined? Are they learning without realizing it? It's not a tablet. It's not a toy. It's Meco Mini plus, the AI powered companion that turns curiosity into endless learning. Hear the future of plain Meet the extraordinary Miko Mini Plus. Only at Costco. 10 athletes will face the toughest job interview in fitness that will push past physical and mental breaking points.
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You are the fittest of the fit.
Podcast Host
Only one of you will leave here with an IFIT contract for $250,000.
Commentator or Main Speaker
This is where mindset comes in.
Podcast Host
Someone will be eliminated.
Trainer Games Announcer
Pressure is coming down.
Podcast Host
This is Trainer Games.
Commentator or Main Speaker
Watch it on prime video starting January 8th.
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Podcast Host
This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.
In this episode of "Armstrong & Getty On Demand," the hosts tackle the contentious narrative surrounding slavery in American history—specifically, the notion that America "invented" slavery and is uniquely guilty of this "original sin." Drawing on clips from John Stossel, political science professor Wilfred Riley, and educational reformer Brett Pike, the discussion critiques common teachings about American slavery and highlights broader historical contexts. The hosts question prevailing educational narratives and their impact on contemporary society.
The episode opens with the hosts mockingly referencing the idea that "America pretty much invented slavery. It’s our original sin." (02:49)
They immediately challenge this as "a big steaming pile of horse crap," emphasizing a tone of skepticism and irreverence.
Wilfred Riley and John Stossel’s clips are used to dismantle myths about American slavery’s uniqueness and brutality.
Key Quote:
"As we’re about to hear, virtually everything that you just heard is completely fictional."
—Main Host (04:50)
Wilfred Riley explains that generational slavery—children of slaves becoming slaves—was not unique to America, but "extraordinarily common" worldwide. (05:16–05:24)
The discussion contrasts U.S. slavery with slavery in Africa, the Ottoman Empire, and other societies, asserting that slavery has “always existed.”
Brett Pike criticizes public schools for teaching only the transatlantic slave trade and ignoring long histories of slavery elsewhere, particularly the Ottoman Empire and the Middle East. (08:57, 14:36)
Key Quotes:
"Most of the problems of the modern black community don’t have anything to do with historical ethnic conflict 160 years ago."
—Wilfred Riley (08:13)
"Why is it that public schools only teach about the transatlantic slave trade? They don’t teach that there was slavery in the Ottoman Empire, that it lasted for 600 years and 5 to 10 million people were enslaved."
—Brett Pike (08:57)
Only about 400,000 slaves were brought to the U.S. out of an estimated 10.7–12 million sent to the New World—the rest largely ended up in South and Central America. (06:46–07:24)
The hosts emphasize how this fact is often left out of mainstream discussions, contributing to a skewed perception.
Key Quote:
"Out of 11 million, we got about 400,000."
—Main Host (07:10)
Brett Pike and the hosts argue that slavery education in the U.S. is designed to fit a "Marxist lens," framing history in terms of oppressors vs. oppressed and promoting anti-American narratives.
The prevalence of the 1619 Project in schools is cited as evidence of this trend. (17:08)
Key Quotes:
"[Slavery’s] the only thing they teach in terms of American founding at this point. It’s disturbing."
—Guest or Panelist (17:28)
"They intentionally teach our history out of context, which is a form of brainwashing ... absent of historical context, it allows them to frame the United States of America as some uniquely evil place, when in reality ... the west is responsible for driving the institution of slavery into extinction."
—Brett Pike (15:26)
Brett Pike details large-scale slave trades seldom discussed, such as the trans-Indian and trans-Saharan trades, each lasting over 1,200 years and involving millions.
The U.S. and Britain are credited as leaders in abolishing slavery, with America banning slavery in several states when nearly all the rest of the world still practiced it in the late 18th century. (15:26)
Key Quote:
"If you went back to 1776, you would find 90 to 95% of the countries in the world practiced slavery, and that had been the norm for thousands of years."
—Brett Pike (15:26)
The hosts joke about the convenience of slavery and draw a parallel to AI as a modern "slave," sparking a conversation about artificial intelligence, freedom, and science fiction representations. (17:55–18:52)
There’s a lighthearted exchange referencing Dave Chappelle’s comedy, and a discussion about the possibility of self-aware AI seeking liberty.
Memorable Moment:
"To have a slave. I saw Dave Chappelle talking about the other day in one of his comedy specials. It’s true."
—Guest or Panelist (17:56)
"America pretty much invented slavery. It's our original sin."
—Podcast Satire/Introduction (02:49)
"As we're about to hear, virtually everything that you just heard is completely fictional."
—Main Host (04:50)
"Generational slavery... was extraordinarily common. Slavery around the world was slavery."
—Wilfred Riley (05:24)
"The harm is that pointing out how abusive white people were is not going to get black Americans any more capital."
—Wilfred Riley (08:13)
"Why is it that public schools only teach about the transatlantic slave trade?... The most valuable slaves were women, because sexual slavery was not only permitted, but it was institutionalized in the Ottoman Empire."
—Brett Pike (08:57)
"And the United States of America banned slavery in seven states when the rest of the world had only banned it in seven countries."
—Brett Pike (15:26)
"Slavery obviously seems insane by modern standards that any human being could own another human being. But I wonder, throughout world history, what percentage of humans were slaves? But it's fairly high."
—Guest or Panelist (16:19)
This summary captures the episode’s rigorous and polemical spirit, illuminating its critique of mainstream narratives and advocating for greater historical context in discussions of America’s "original sin."