The Bugle - Why are soccer kits so woke?

Episode Date: March 26, 2024

To understand why so many things are going wrong on a macro level, The Bugle zooms in on society this week, in the hope that it explains a few things. Including - are hot cross buns offensive, what's up with all our food, are football kits woke and whatever Trump is banging on about.Recorded in Leeds, Andy Zaltzman is joined by Ria Lina and Nato Green.Send thoughts and questions for Andy at [e-mail]. Click follow to make sure you get every episode and please drop us a nice review or rating wherever you choose.This episode was presented and written by:Andy ZaltzmanRia Lina Nato GreenAnd producer by Chris Skinner and Laura Turner Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Bugle, audio newspaper for a visual world. Hello, welcome to The Bugle. I am Andy Zoltzman. This is issue 4296 of this audio newspaper for this visual world. It was recorded live at the City Varieties Music Hall in Leeds with me, Rheolina, and joining us from San Francisco, NATO Green, producer Chris was also on stage. Do enjoy the show. Chris, play the tape. This is our first ever Bugle Live in Yorkshire. The independent republic of Yorkshire. We are here in Leeds where 300 years ago it was 1724. Would you believe that?

Yorkshire, of course, the old Viking lands ruled over with an iron fist of blood indeed by the Scandinavian warlock classes back in the day have you calmed down since do you think that Viking impulse is still there after which the Normans got a bit feisty up here apparently what do you think of the Normans here in Leeds yeah never forget never forget Yorkshire has long. At the time of the Norman Conquest, the inventory of Leeds, this city contained six ploughs, a priest, a church, and a mill. It had a taxable value of six pounds. And it's gone up a bit, bit I think hasn't it? It's got up... but so so you know basically the Normans made this place you might not like it but that's a fact

Leeds. Of course then things toddled along for a while until the next significant development in Leeds which was of course the opening of Headingley Cricket Ground in 1890. Yorkshire of course famously the home county of many celebs, the Bronte sisters. It's a key demographic, Bronte fans. As long as McIntire's not taking it, I'll f***ing have it. Now, in fact in this very theatre, the tribute act Bronte Sister Sledge will be performing the novels of the 19th century literary legends in a classic 1970s disco groove. Also Richard III, famous Yorkshireman, the erstwhile king, alleged nephew murderer and

world record holder for most expensive car park bill ever. He of course played for Yorkshire in the Wars of the Roses, the classic 15th century series. Have you got over that yet? In fact new evidence has just suggested that Lord Stanley, after his controversial transfer to Lancashire, was offside at the Battle of Bosworth before Richard III was unceremoniously kebab to death. So actually, they might have to have a replay somewhere on the M62. Richard III's last words, famously, I see you guys are not really going for the one horse for one kingdom swapsie, but could you at least give me a lift back to the car park? I've left the windows open on the Vitesse.

So there we go. And of course, that horse, a horse, my kingdom for all, that was the peak of the late 15th century horse speculation bubble. When a single horse became briefly worse than the entire GDP of the English nation, the market inevitably collapsed and the Tudor regime had to impose a standard horse value tied to the European tourniquet. Fact, are we learning? There are a lot of facts in the bugle, that's what you need to know about if you've not seen it before. And also Yorkshire as part of the Battle of the Wars of the Roses hosted the Battle of

Towton in 1461. It's good that places like Towton could still get major events in those days because now it tends to go to all the big cities doesn't it? But in those days you are put in the right bid and you got to host a battle. Reportedly it was the bloodiest day of combat ever, single day of combat ever in the history of the British Isles. 28,000 people were apparently killed in a single day of hand-to-hand combat and you've just got to admire the work rate. Do you not think people in those days getting stuck in, killing each other, you know, not whinging saying,

oh, no, it's not for me. I'm not feeling very well. I just don't think our youngsters would have the capacity to do that these days. We have to hire in a load of Poles and Bulgarians to kill each other for us. Thank you, Brussels. So anyway, so we are recording this here in Leeds on the 24th of March. On this day in 1829 the Parliament passed the Roman Catholic Relief Act allowing Catholics to

serve in Parliament. Roman Catholic Relief was in fact the first celebrity fundraising event in UK history as the big stars of the day teamed up to raise money by Being Roman Catholic for the evening Celebrity poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge and William wordsy Wordsworth did a very amusing two-handed poem about a socially awkward cardinal and a foul-mouthed talking pelican And on the 26th of March in 1351, we had the combat of the 30. This was 30 Breton knights versus 30 English knights in a special fight, part of the Hundred Years War, which, Hundred Years War lasted 116 years, I think. Just, you know, you just go, oh no.

Some people complain about them making chocolate bars shorter these days. They swizz people out of... Wasn't that after tax? Is that why? Oh yeah, it's quite possible. It was the short to life expectancy. You want more year for your buck.

Oh, definitely. I digress. So, I mean, so there we go. Anyway, we lost apparently, so we never learn about it in, well look at that. Proper St. George's cross on the kit in those days proper who cares if we fucking lost please we'll talk about this more later on right top story this

week we're off the hook as human beings. We haven't completely fucked up the planet. This is according to a declaration from the International Union of Geological Sciences who have upheld a vote by other boffins, stroke scientists, stroke potatoes, stroke potatos, against officially declaring this to be the Anthropocene Age, and adding that to the timeline of the planet Earth. Now, Rhea, you're a scientist, you're a qualified scientist, the best kind of scientist.

Thank you. So you're going to have to do the heavy lifting on this story, because I have... We're lumping all science in together. Yeah, absolutely. We're not going to care that this is not my area of expertise okay I don't care all right I'll take it yeah you call me doctor doctor Dr. Lena so they've said it's not the Anthropocene era this is a 24 boffin strong committee yes they've because some people had argued that we humans the world's most famous ever species, have had such a

beshitifying impact on the planet that we've actually catapulted it into a new geological epoch, but they've said that's not the case. Well they voted against it, but it was controversial. It was a very controversial vote because some people on the committee had actually outlasted their term. And as you know that if you vote when you're not supposed to be on the committee you're no longer a geologist. That's how that... Yeah. No, they'd expired as geologists. So some people aren't sure whether they were allowed to be there. So that's part of the problem with the vote. But essentially, yes, they're asking whether we started a new epoch

because we divide... Geology divides the planet's history into eras periods epochs and ages Right and and they wanted to start a new epoch, but then all the guys said no No, because they couldn't decide when to start it. They wanted to start it in 1952. What happened in 1952? Oh, well, I know well here in Headingley Who leaves at Headingley England had India naught for 4 at the start of their second innings. And that was very much on the table in the debate. They were very much discussing that. They were just like, but what about the thing that happened in Henley in 1952? But it wasn't enough and they said it wasn't, which the whole thing just blows my mind

because Mother Nature has been sitting here on the planet doing her thing, going through her ages, having her periods, right? As she's allowed to do. And then along come a bunch of men and go, no, we're going to vote on what's happening with your body. And quite rightly, they got shot down. Right. Nata, what's your view on this?

Do you think we've put in a lot of effort as a species to In this planet up do you not think we deserve to be acknowledged for what we've done and having this epoch named well themselves Yeah, Andy the proposal was to was to create establish the beginning of a new epoch called the Anthropocene That reflected the role of humanity in shaping the geologic history and I think it's I think they voted correctly deciding that it's not the Anthropocene because we're already on to the next epoch which is the C***o's Pocene. C***o's Pocene, did I say that right? Which is the world being shaped by C***s primarily. The scientists worked on this.

Sorry, as a scientist I'd say it was started with the Dicocene epoch. I'm not a fan of the science fiction. I'm not a fan of the science fiction. I'm not a fan of the science fiction. I'm not a fan of the science fiction. I'm not a fan of the science fiction.

I'm not a fan of the science fiction. I'm not a fan of the science fiction. nothing to show for it, much like my stand-up career. And it's not really up for debate that we've wrecked the planet, but whether we've done it so badly that it leaves a mark in the Earth's substrate. Like a million years from now, could scientists look at a rock wall at sedimentary layers and see and go, see there, see that shitty looking layer, that's Brexit. You can tell it's Brexit because there's no Tiresio. We'll have a strata in the thing and I think it'll just be a layer of microplastics.

You know, it's just a rock, rock, rock, rock, plastic and then rock, rock, rock, rock, all of humanity. Just eight billion bodies as we, as we f*** it all up. But no, but they, they decided that they couldn't, so if you don't know, you have to have a definite beginning to an epoch. You can't just, you can't just arbitrarily decide to have an epoch. And they were arguing over 15 years, just as, just as NATO said, they said they were discussing it for 15 years. What's the beginning of this epoch? And for whatever reason they went, we want to vote on whether it's 1952, which as we know,

is this Henley thing. You know, and they just went, no, that's not enough. Why they didn't, you know, and what they're tracking, by the way, is they're tracking some of the radioactive damage that came from all the nuclear bomb testing. And you go, so why are we saying it started in 1952? Surely 1945 had something major to do with it. But no, apparently the Henley thing was actually more monumental.

Freddie Truman was amazing that day. I mean, other suggestions for what it should be called, the boys will be boys epoch, bit simplistic, we're not far off, the age of myopically self-interested, commercially driven, a bit long, and the vroom vroom boom boom kaboom epoch. But there were copyright issues with the 1970s

prog funk, metal rock, post skiffle, anti-grunge band from Wetherby. So they couldn't do that. But I mean, it would be quite an impressive effort if in this short amount of time we've started a new epoch, because they generally last for millions and millions of years. The Holocene era, which we're currently stuck in apparently, is barely 12,000 years old. They usually take a good two and a half million years to knock off their perch. Some of the other epochs we've had, there was the Paleocene, the Oligocene, the Plastocene,

the stay on the scene, the luck-a-sex-ma-cene. And the worst comedian I've ever seen. That was an epoch that lasted 20 minutes for me at the Burkha, just down the road. So over the rest of the show show we will look at exactly why we have, why we are f***ing up the planet quite so much and why we're doing so badly as species in in charge. So let's have let's have a stinkeris. Human instinct for completely f**king pointless arguments news now. And we had a look at the big stories from this week.

In fact, I'm looking at them now and I can summarize the big stories from this week as oh f**k, oh jeez, ah, again? Shit, oh for f**k's sake. So nothing of great comic levity obviously on offer there. I did try to write a joke about the news and it came out like this. Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu in the leadership of Hamas walked into a bar and the barman said We're closed. Fuck off. That's basically what I could get out of it. So rather than looking at all the big disputes of the world we're going to look at some of the small disputes of the world because

But rather than looking at all the big disputes of the world, we're going to look at some of the small disputes of the world. Because can we really expect these big solutions, big issues to be solved if we are not sorting out the smaller issues for ourselves? We hear about trickle-down economics. There's also trickle-up politics. So the way I see it is people complain about massive corporate tax evasion. But then who here rides a bicycle? Yep.

And put your hands up if you've ever cycled through a red light. Yeah, absolutely you have. Yeah. So why should we expect our banks to pay their fair share of tax if people like you are setting such a f***ing bad example for them? So who here has ever had a relationship break up? Yep. Do you mind if I ask, their relationship broke up? Yep. I picked poorly. And yet, you know, we have our relationship

break up for various reasons and yet we expect the Middle East to magically fix itself after 5,000 years of squibbly squabbly ever since Big G said, yeah, you can have that bit and don't eat pigs. So I'll tell you what we've got. Let's start with America, NATO, and the exciting news that Donald Trump, your past and potentially future president, who's is the bookies favorite to win the election in November,

he gave an interview with Nigel Farage. He said that America will 100% remain in NATO. Not you, obviously. See, NATO is a comedian named after two things that Donald Trump f***ing hates. So, as long as European countries play... Andy, I would be very happy if Donald Trump pulled out of me. And then paid your hush money. So on NATO, can you just bring us, what's your analysis of the state of your election campaign and is NATO going to survive a second Trump term? Well, so it's sort of the whole thing feels like Trump is such a gangster. Like he had said that he would quote, encourage Russia to do whatever the hell they want,

end quote, to NATO countries that didn't meet their financial obligations. And now he's saying vaguely that he will 100% remain in NATO if he returns if they don't take advantage. It feels all, it all feels like a big protection racket, you know what I mean? Like, oh, that's a nice Belgium you got there. It would be a shame if anything happened to it.

You know, there's this, my friend Vladimir, he doesn't wear a shirt and he gets crazy sometimes. He has a video of me being peed on. And you gotta put up some money so nothing happens. In the same interview Trump said that there was a nice big beautiful ocean between Europe and the Americas apropos of nothing and when he's right he's right there is a notion. Yeah, yeah, so he did he did finally discover something that was also discovered in the 15th century

but that's fine. 100% he said, 100% obviously current legal proceedings suggest that Trump's mathematics is not always 100% completely accurate itself and but even some Tory ministers have said we shouldn't necessarily rely on Trump. In fact relying on Trump to me is a bit like jumping out of a helicopter without a parachute and thinking I'm sure a passing pterodactyl will pick me up in its beak and deposit me safely back in my garden. So Rhea, I've been, do you enjoy American politics? Enjoy it, enjoy it. I follow it, I feel, I follow it in the same way

that you keep an eye on that one crazy person that's wandering around the supermarket because you never know what they're gonna pull out and stab, do you know what I mean? Like you just sort of go, ha ha ha ha. But you know what I hate about this story is I hate that I kind of sort of agree with elements of it and it makes me feel sick to my stomach.

But the fact that Grant Schatz has suddenly realized that if Europe wants Europe's backyard to be safe, that Europe might have to actually defend it. I kind of agree. Like NATO is, you know, everybody's joined NATO and they've joined it just sort of going so if we join America's gonna fight for us. And it's true, up until now America's just like, yeah! Where's the fight, where's the blood, I'm gonna do it. And Trump's suddenly going, no, no, not us. And they're going, oh shit, we'll have to do it ourselves.

But I get why, Europe has been, you know, Europe is too advanced for its own good. It's advanced beyond the idea of violence as a form of solution. It's bit itself in the ass with that. Well, I mean, to be fair, we did really give it a good go. I mean, arguably for a slightly too long. We've been violent for longer in Europe, okay,

and we got to the end of it and we tired of it But not everybody else was done with the game and then that's the point you can't retire, you know Trying to figure out how to say in terms you'll understand. It's sort of like It's like if baseball players suddenly stormed a cricket pitch and we're like we want to play You know what I mean? And the cricketers areeters are like well we've been doing this for seven days already what's it still quite early on in the second test so we and the baseball players are just like so we got a couple hours in us and then we're burned out and that's kind of like and then the cricketers are like okay well you keep going but we're actually pausing for tea because that's

it's tea time now and then they leave to go play tea and then the baseball players are like you're gonna have to finish this shit because we have no fucking clue what we're doing and we can't tell who's who because you're all in white yeah it's fair cool can't argue with any of that In other pointless arguments, I think this story about the St. George's Cross on the England football shirt, and it's caused absolute fucking mayhem in the sort of list of overblown nothingnesses. I think this is mo- might be the most ridiculous confected squabble that we've had in some time and that is a hotly contested title. I mean we once again find ourselves on the brink of total civil

war because actually what's a passing breeze and a spot of light drizzle in an extremely small disposable teacup but still this is basically a new front in the culture wars. This shirt has been accused of being woke. I don't know... Andy, can I help? Yeah, you can help, NATO. Andy, being from San Francisco, the capital of homosexuality in the world, are you familiar with the gay pride flag, the rainbow flag? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So do you know that there are different subflags for other identities? Right, OK, yeah. OK, and so that image right there is actually the bisexual pride flag. Really? It is, 100%. OK, right. I mean, because I'd interpreted it slightly differently Really? It is, 100%. Okay. Right.

I mean, because I'd interpreted it slightly differently, as I thought obviously these things may obviously mean a lot, you know, these fashion companies don't just put things up for no f***ing reason whatsoever. They mean deep philosophical things. So the purple, the two purple lines, they represent the fierce resistance of the ancient Trinovantes tribe, who of course dressed in purple and smeared themselves in blackberries over the non-existent Visigoth invasion

of 300 BC, which didn't actually happen but they would have been really brave against it had it happened. The off pink, that's something to do with the colour of the sunset on the, that's the right hand one at the top, the colour of the sunset on the day that Shakespeare wrote his smash hit sonnet, Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day? The original draft of which was, Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's day? The original draft of which was shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Yes Oh, I love you like a summer's day in that I can't spend any time with you because the crickets on It's 142 for three any chance of a cup of tea The three the three vertical or the vertical red bands, the different shades of red, stand for the various different

things that have been made to stop by Brexit. So I think that's entirely relevant as well. And the purple, the other sort of dark, then we've got the blue, there's two blues. One is for St. George, who was renowned for his fruity language. In fact, he famously said, "'I'm gonna f*** that f***ing drug and write the f*** up. "'Who's f***ing with me? F*** it, oodle-do.'" And off he went.

And the darker blue is famously the color of Queen Victoria's favorite underwear. So, I mean, obviously it's hugely important that a tiny little bit of a shirt that you can't really see because it's on the back of people's necks should cause daily telera columnists to absolutely shit themselves to billio. I mean, there's so much controversy about this. Like as NATO said, it is very similar to the bisexual flag, which is upset people. The bisexual flag is actually pink purple blue

Of course, this was purple like a light blue and a dark a very specific version of bisexuality Which we have her here in the UK, which is men who fuck each other all the way through public school and university But then settle down to marry women and have kids That's their flag that's our government you're talking about real respect not for long That's their flag. That's all government you're talking about, Rhea. Some f***ing respect. Not for long. It's caused a lot of conversation on the internet. Of course, this flag, people are saying, of course,

that it's all these different shades, that it shouldn't be red, blues, purples. Other people are saying, no, it's white and gold. And it just depends which way you look at it and which picture that you're looking at as to what you're seeing. But fundamentally again, and I'm really shocking myself this week

and I'm a bit worried about which way I'm gonna end up voting in the election because I actually do agree again with both Sunak and Keir Starmer have come together. And I'm always saying we need to come together when there's a good idea or when something's going on, we need to stop this bipartisan politics, we need to stop two party politics. we need to stop two-party politics.

Sunak and Stammer have both said, don't mess with it, just don't mess with it. And I agree, we're in such a time right now that we can't afford any more change and we just can't afford to separate racism from football right now. Andy, can I ask you a question? Yeah. So I really rely on this show to learn about the essence of Britishness. All right, good. And could you explain to me what is more quintessentially British, defending an empty symbolic tradition

for the sake of tradition or making a bad decision and sticking to it even when it fails because you don't want to be seen as weak. Oh. But also, we've got all English sports teams have not always, you know, had the, I mean, the 1966 World Cup winning football team, of course, famously won in shirts colored the red of Soviet Russia. No one f***ing complained about that then, did they? The Ashes team that won in 1953 were wearing the all-white of Surrender. Um, and David Wilkie won Olympic gold in the swimming pool in 1976

wearing just a pair of Speedos. Now, in what way is that respecting what St George did for this country? You know, he obviously never came here, St George, and he was from modern-day Turkey. And I think it's just a bit of a shame that so many of our top patron saint positions are taken up by overseas saints. So I think his grandmother was born in Somerset or something, that's how he got the gig. And it's just, it's not really encouraging our young people to behave in a particularly

saintly manner, they just don't see the openings. All right, let's go with hot cross buns news now. Well another completely pointless argument and this is that Christian groups have been up in arms because a supermarket, Iceland, has been selling hot cross buns that instead of a cross have had a tick on it and apparently this is in defiance of our Christian heritage that we should put well means of death on our snacks which I think I think in a way that you know putting a cross and that's I think maybe would would would would it have been better if Jesus had not been crucified

But had been tick sified instead So that rather than the Christianity that the symbol being a cross which quite a negative thing it was It was a tick which is right and how does that work just I? Can do this because I'm Jewish. Are you tixifying yourself? Yeah. You can probably do both ankles with the same nail as well, actually, if you get... Oh, I see what you're doing. Okay, I see. You see, I wasn't sure. All sure all I could have pictures that you know Ticksifying involved a whole bunch of people going just do it

Which is what to be fair he was guilty Don't judge him by today's legal and ethical standards according to the letter of the law at the time he was guilty He knew what he was doing. I'd know the little wrap again. I've had the chance He he cost us a lot of market share. And if that routine is wrong, Lord, strike me down now. And I do realize that is a bit of a high-risk gambit in a building that was built under 19th century fire regulations. Now, NATO, I imagine America has been rocked to its core by the story of, uh, Britain abandoning its Christian heritage by putting a tick on a, on a hot cross bun.

It's been a huge news in San Francisco. Yeah, well, I mean, Andy, you know, speaking from one lapstoo to another, uh, obviously you and I both know that Christianity is the matrix reloaded of monotheism. So hot cross bun sounds like an S&M sex thing like spank me with a cross the phrase nutmeg out of my asshole has been spoken in this room probably since Connie Francis did it here in 1955. It would make you question, is that a raisin? Family shop, family shop. But the move is opposed by an organization called Open Doors,

which works with persecuted Christians around the world. Persecute, Siri, show me the whitest shit ever. Are Christians persecuted? Oh, my Siri just answered, actually, and said, I don't have an answer for that. So it raises questions for me, are Christians persecuted in England and is it a form of persecution to not be able to see a cross at all times? Is that oppression?

Are Christians like Aquaman in that not touching water deprives them of their powers, but the water is a line of sight connection of a cross. So the Evangelical Alliance said, Easter is when Christians across the globe remember Jesus died on the cross and rose from the grave. Whatever Iceland puts on their buns, Christians will continue to declare the truth of the cross that Jesus is alive. Have fun with that Christians, I'll wait outside. So in the article the researchers for Iceland said that Iceland's research found that a fifth of its customers would prefer to have a tic, which also begs the questions

what other images did they test out? The only one that didn't get to 20%. The one that would be really challenging is if they tried hot literal depiction of the face of the prophet Mohammed Bunn's bacon sandwich. I guess that would be a tricky sell. Reform MP Lee Anderson said that it's this type of namby-pamby virtue signaling that is leading to millions of people echoing Reform UK's call to get our country back. He also thinks that the new football kid is virtue signaling. Lee Anderson thinks that anything he doesn't like is virtue signaling. Let's take our country back!

Where all our food was f***ing disgusting! Before f***ing Brussels got involved and made us use spices and shit. They actually cut off the Lee Anderson interview because he was complaining about it, just as NATO said, all of this virtue signaling. And then they said, but the buns are only 30p and he went oh no I'm alright with that. I love actually he mentioned Henrietta Blythe the chief executive of the charity Open Doors which is you know who works with these persecuted Christians around the world and she said the cross is still of huge significance to millions of people. I'm not sure whose side she's on in this battle.

I don't know if she's fighting for the cross to go back on the bun or not, because then she said, I understand why people may not want to see a cross on their tea cake. It represents one of the most agonizing forms of execution ever devised. You could say it's like having an electric chair on a croissant. Well the first thing I thought was that's not a bad way to toast it. I mean, a croissant's not an ideal shape for putting pictures on though, is it? You have to be quite a small bendy electric chair. I don't think she's thought that through, to be honest. Well, maybe it's an Ikea electric chair and it's still flat packed.

Right, it's quite possible. I mean, I don't know what form of execution would fit better on a croissant than... A noose? A noose? Oh, what? A guillotine. What? I know it's French, that would fit on...

Look, I'm not disputing that the croissant and the guillotine are part of the same cultural continuum. I'm just saying the guillotine would... The guillotine would fit on a fucking baguette. I mean, if we're going to get technical, the croissant's actually Austrian, so... So we could put a tiny little assassin shooting at a count. It wasn't a count. Who was it?

Shit. What was he? What was he? Archduke. Thank you. A tiny little assassin shooting at an archduke. That's for the edit. Right.

But to be fair, I mean, to get back to the story, obviously the open doors, that's how Jesus escaped I think, anyway. But the... Took him three days though. Pushing at the door going, this was supposed to be open. Presumably when he died on the cross and then rose two days later from the grave, he'd been pretty peckish, he'd haveish. He'd have wanted someone with a bit of sugar

and a bit of starch. So the hot cross, hence the hot cross. He probably didn't want to be reminded of the cross though. Is that why it's called a croissant? Shouldn't it always have been on a croissant? A croissant. A cross. Right.

So were you saying Jesus was crucified on a croissant-shaped cross? This game. Just saying, that's a huge coincidence. He did love his fruity buns though, to be fair, Jesus. Have you heard of Jesus? Oh, surprisingly. God, he used to be quite a big celeb.

Literally no one had said they'd heard of Jesus. For those who have not heard of him, prominent turner of the first millennium, Middle East-based magician and raconteur. Again, bit of a Jewish angle on the guy. But he, one of his lesser known, he loved fruit fruit-based buns, one of his lesser known miracles was turning a packet of supermarket raisins and a bucket of flour into the world's biggest Eccles cake. Do you know that? It was 10 meters across and then he jumped on it,

levitated and karate chopped the Eccles cake into 5,000 regular sized Eccles cakes for his adoring fans. That's from the gospel according to St. Maurice, chapter 14, verse 12 to 21. In fact, look, that's just how the Bible started. I'm just bringing it up today. Um. Um. Right, so we move on to humans doing unhealthy things to ourselves news now.

Obviously we are probably the greatest species in the world at damaging ourselves with all due respect to the lemmings who put in an effort, but they don't have quite the range I don't think, of ways of damaging ourselves that we have. And this goes from large scale things. This week we found the world's largest oil companies reported to be way off track on their emissions goals. Who is surprised by that? Yes, there we go that you're a scientist Rhea how we're gonna fix this shit well honestly I mean I think the next few stories are gonna tell us how we're naturally through a process of natural selection gonna fix this shit by doing

such insanely stupid stuff to our ourselves that we will eventually be our own demise. Problem solved. Yeah. I think that might be the most optimistic thing anyone's ever said on a bugle, actually. So, Naito, I know you're a huge fan of multinational oil companies. Namely. I mean, do you feel sorry for them that they've been told off in this way? You know, Andy, I'm actually quite excited about this news, that oil and carbon emissions, because after decades of lying to us about the science of climate change and buying their

own research and lobbying against any and all regulation, it would have been disappointing if there was like a big Act three personal transformation on behalf of the part of the fossil fuel industry and they suddenly became virtuous after trying to kill everyone for 100 years. You know what I mean? Like, imagine that the oil industry is Thanos in Avengers Infinity War and he spends all of Infinity War trying to get the Infinity Gauntlet to wipe out half of all life

in the universe to create a universe of abundance so that people aren't fighting over scarce resources. And then after three hours of fisticuffs with the Avengers, someone points out to Thanos that he could also use the Infinity Gauntlet to just double the amount of food and solve the problem. That's a very accessible way of putting it. There would be more virtuous but such a shitty ending to the movie if he was like, you know what, I was wrong, never mind. Well, you mentioned the things that we are doing to ourselves.

Vaping, vaping news now, let's have a sting. It's turned out that breathing in toxic fumes from untested substances into the very depths of your lungs. See, I'm just a lay-by. I'd always rashly assume that breathing these things are actually, you know, because they're fruit-flavored. They're actually probably got quite a lot of vitamin C in and would actually probably do wonders for your skin. But apparently, I've been lied to by myself.

Oh, yeah. You know, the fruity bits are fine. Oh, myself. Oh yeah you know the fruity bits are fine. Oh yeah. No the fruity bits are fine it's the oil that you heat up and like emulsify and then shove into your lungs that your lungs are kind of like not what we're made for. Give us a couple hundred maybe thousand years to evolve and maybe we will be able to but right now I just it just blows my mind though I mean I am a scientist love science love the whole process like go science love it but but there's so many things that we do need to do with science, like find and then achieve alternatives

to fossil fuels, and I'm like, who's paying for someone to look up the friggin' obvious and then write that up in a paper and then publish it, and then we're all here giving them a pat on the back going, well done, we weren't sure. Like, I'm tired of this kind of science. It was a no-brainer. It was a no-brainer that that was not a good idea, but we've had to wait for someone to

officially say it wasn't a good idea. Well, I mean, my personal worry is that these generation of British children, if we suddenly start banning vapes, we fought world wars for our right to breathe in bubble gum and cherry-cola scented clouds. You're beginning to sound like Liz Truss. Yeah. Liz Truss also is not happy with the smoking ban. She thinks this... You know how we've banned smoking for anyone born after January 1st 2009? NATO, do you know this? Here in the UK, if you're born... I read up on it, yeah. If you're born after January 1st in NATO, do you know this? Here in the UK if you're born after- I read up on it, yeah. If you're born after January 1st in 2009,

you are not allowed to ever buy cigarettes in this country. And Liz Truss says that is an infringement on our freedoms and it is wrong, but you use my bathroom. And you're in trouble. So you're sounding like Liz now. All right, well, that is a bit of a f***ery, to be honest. Um, Nate, what's the vaping as popular in California as it is over here? Oh, it's huge. And it's a great plan that we created an 18 billion dollar market before

we studied the health effects. Who would have anticipated that belating a glow stick might not be good for you? But as I understand the technical detail of the study that it's not conclusive that vaping causes cancer, but it could rewrite your DNA. So we've had decades now of comic books and sci-fi about bioengineering to create advanced humans and super soldiers and whatnot. And instead we're just creating new technology

to alter human DNA to make it easier to get face cancer. Take that Gregor Mendel. What a reference. I love it. Gregor Mendel would have been thrilled if someone had only explained to the 19th century Austrian monk what vaping and cancer and DNA meant, but he would be into it. Then he might have thought twice about working with those pea plants Niche I mean I guess In other unhealthy shit news now ultra processed foods have also turned out to be not entirely Good for your the guts that evolved over tens of thousands of years eating not ultra processed foods

tens of thousands of years eating not ultra-processed foods. So basically, the scientific researchers eating a sausage and cornflake sandwich dipped in Coca-Cola is now on a level with most dangerous things to do in your lunch break, alongside headbutting a sleeping crocodile in a zoo, practicing ballet on a homemade raft in a busy shipping lane, and chainsaw wrestling. So, Minister, anything left that we can do now without damaging ourselves?

You know, I welcome it all. I just think that there's eight billion of us on the planet right now, and if people need science before they'll realize that some of this is maybe not a good idea. I'm sorry, I'm being so, I know. Because I know there's a lot of people in this room that vape and they're just like, are you saying I should die? No, I'm not. Because especially if you came from smoking and you're using vaping to get away from smoking, fine.

Although what this study has showed is that it's still going to warp your DNA and your children are all going to have four feet and three boobs, but just saying. Is that a problem? I mean, the current advice, if you wanna eat healthy and avoid ultra processed foods, is that all food should be eaten directly from a tree or cow, and swallowed whole like a python would swallow it.

So, I mean, there's a danger, I think. I mean, NATO, obviously America's not entirely famed for its healthy eating habits. It's... Cheese in a can, cheese in a can, bum, bum, cheese in a can. Yeah, I mean, that is... Is that the end of civilization?

Cheddar and bacon, easy cheese? Does it become kosher if it's in a can later? What's American flavors? It tastes like gunpowder Look Rhea you're a scientist I have a question. Is the purpose of scientific research to help the reader find loopholes? Because I read the study about ultra processed foods and my immediate thought is I need definitions. Define your terms. You know what I mean? I read an article that men of my age shouldn't have more than four drinks per day, and so now I'm carefully measuring out 3.8 drinks per day.

And I'm writing the research team, the scholars who wrote the study, saying define a drink. Technically, a goblet of Navy strength drink gin is one drink. You know what I mean like so so I look at the ultra processed foods study and it says okay fizzy drinks I don't really drink fizzy drinks junk food fine sugar seals fine ready to eat meals I'm good how about what what are how about our carnitas super burritos ultra processed?

Do you have bow stocks in England? Do you know what that is? It's the best food ever. What is it? What's that? No, a bow stock is like a brioche or a croissant dough that's been soaked in sugar syrup and then baked with like a frangipane or a marzipan

and maybe some fresh lavender leaves on it. Quite really quite magnificent. Basically the study turns me into a Talmudic scholar where I'm debating like what is the precise line between processed and ultra processed? Like how processed can I be before I'm too processed? That's what I'm too processed? That's what I'm trying to figure out. I think to make it easy for you, NATO,

I think it's a slightly more complex answer over here in the UK, but in America, I think the simple answer is, given what you have available to you, you're f**ked. Well, that was what we had to say in Leeds, if you want to hear what we had to say in Edinburgh on the 28th March and Salford on the 30th March. Well, come to those shows. If you live in London or indeed anywhere else in the world and are wanting to come to London

in early June, we have a couple of dates at the Leicester Square Theatre on the 7th and 8th. All details at thebuglepodcast.com where you can also join the Bugle Voluntary Subscription Scheme, give a one-off or a current contribution to help keep this show free, flourishing and independent. Until next week, goodbye.