A grim milestone in Afghanistan this week as the country marks 1,000 days since girls were banned from attending secondary school. Afghanistan is once more a desperate place for women, who are seeing their rights fade away in a reality Malala Yousafzai calls “gender apartheid.” Malala discusses her foundation’s announcement today of another $1.5 million pledged to keep girls’ education alive.
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00:00Hello, everyone, and welcome to Amman Porn Company. Here's what's coming up.
00:08We refuse to let the Taliban deprive girls of their future.
00:13A call to action after a thousand days since the Taliban banned Afghan girls from going
00:18to school. I speak to Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai, and ...
00:23When terrorists are shooting at you, you just leave everything behind.
00:27Remembering Nova, founder of the music festival Ofir Amir, tells me about surviving Hamas'
00:33attack and his new exhibit documenting that day. Then ...
00:38It was a shockingly different time. The past is a foreign country.
00:42The year of living constitutionally. Hari Sreenivasan talks to author A.J. Jacobs, who
00:48spent 12 months living like it's the 1700s. Amman Porn Company is made possible by the
01:13Anderson Family Endowment, Jim Atwood and Leslie Williams, Candice King Weir, The Family
01:20Foundation of Layla and Mickey Strauss, Mark J. Bleschner, The Philemon M. D'Agostino Foundation,
01:29Seton J. Melvin, Charles Rosenblum, Kou and Patricia Ewen, committed to bridging cultural
01:36differences in our communities. Barbara Hope Zuckerberg. Additional support provided by
01:43these funders, and by contributions to your PBS station from viewers like you. Thank you.
01:52Welcome to the program, everyone. I'm Bianna Golodryga in New York, sitting in for Christiane
01:56Amanpour. A grim milestone in Afghanistan this week, as the country marks a thousand
02:01days since girls were banned from attending secondary school. This has the Taliban continue
02:07to tighten their grip on the country, despite promising moderation after taking power in
02:12August of 2021. It is now once more a desperate place for women, who for public parks, to
02:18jobs, find themselves fading away. And it's a reality Malala Yousafzai calls gender apartheid,
02:25a term she calls on world leaders to recognize as a crime against humanity. Malala, of course,
02:31is a survivor of that violence against girls, shot by a Pakistani Taliban, by the Pakistani
02:36Taliban on her way home from school, when she was just 15 years old. She has since become
02:41the youngest ever Nobel Peace Prize winner, and a fierce advocate for the rights of girls
02:46and women around the world. Today, her foundation, the Malala Fund, is announcing another one
02:51and a half million dollars to keep girls' education alive in Afghanistan. And she joins
02:57me now from New York. Malala Yousafzai, thank you so much for joining us on this program,
03:03on this really grim milestone, marking 1,000 days since girls in Afghanistan have been
03:10deprived of what should be something every child is entitled to. And that, obviously,
03:17is an education. Just talk to us personally about what this moment means for you.
03:26It has been three years that Afghan girls have not seen their classrooms. It has been
03:32more than 1,000 days that Afghan girls have not seen the opportunity to learn. And that
03:38is making girlhood illegal in Afghanistan. The Taliban are denying women and girls their
03:45human rights. And this should shock us. This should put us into action.
03:52That's why I think it's so important for us to call it a systematic oppression imposed
03:58by the Taliban on the women of Afghanistan, which is limiting them from education, from
04:03learning, from work, and from a public life. And that is why Afghan women activists are
04:08calling it a gender apartheid, which means it is a systematic oppression by those who
04:13are in power, who are meant to actually protect them.
04:16There is no place for Afghan women to go to. They have currently no future.
04:24Are you satisfied? And I would assume the answer is no. With the attention and focus
04:31this specific issue is getting from around the world and the pressure being put on the
04:36Taliban to bring this up time and time again, the real abuse, emotional, mental, psychological,
04:44and even physical that women have had to endure since they came back into power.
04:51I have been doing this activism since the fall of Kabul in 2021. And I remember at that
04:57time the outrage that Afghan women and girls were showing that we cannot trust the Taliban.
05:02But some people said that we need to give them a bit more time and we need to trust
05:06the Taliban on their promises. But the women, the Afghan women knew it. Now it has been
05:11more than three years. What is the excuse now?
05:15It is so important that those who are negotiating and talking to the Taliban prioritize women's
05:20rights and girls' education, that women's rights and girls' education is a non-negotiable
05:26condition on the table. And those women have to be in those rooms where decisions about
05:30their future are made.
05:32And there are meetings happening the end of this month as well. So, I do push leaders.
05:36I do push the U.N. officials as well, that they have to ensure that there is no compromise
05:42on the rights of women and girls. We cannot live in a society where we all claim, our
05:47leaders claim that we care about gender equity and equality, while we are putting all of
05:52that at risk in Afghanistan.
05:55We are not even reacting that girls' education right now is banned, is prohibited for girls.
06:02A reminder of the false promises made and perhaps the naive trust or hope that was given
06:10to this new Taliban, as they called it, 2.0, when they came back to power.
06:16This has been an issue that we have focused a lot of time on here at CNN, Christiane Amanpour
06:21specifically, as you know. And she brought this question up with the deputy leader of
06:27the Taliban at the time in 2022, and asked him about girls' rights.
06:32Here's what he had to say.
06:33What I am saying is that the international community is raising the issue of women's
06:42rights a lot. Here in Afghanistan, there are Islamic, national, cultural and traditional
06:53principles. Within the limit of those principles, we are working to provide them with opportunities
07:03to work, and that is our goal.
07:06Well, how do you respond to that? What are these, quote-unquote, opportunities within
07:11the limits of the parameters, he said?
07:15There are a dozen of Muslim countries in the world. And in none of those Muslim countries
07:19do you see girls prohibited from education or women prohibited from work. It's not a
07:23crime for girls to have rights in those countries.
07:27At the same time, we know that culture and religion are often used as an excuse by the
07:31Taliban and by other extremists as well to limit women, to protect their misogyny. There
07:38is no solid basis for that at all. Islam actually encourages education for all children, for
07:44everybody. And in Islam, it is your responsibility to get education.
07:49I don't know what sort of system, what sort of ideology they are talking about, but the
07:55culture that I come from and the religion that I know, it encourages education. And
07:59I think the Taliban need to – we also – like, at this point, I would say we need more Muslim
08:05leaders and more Muslim countries to step forward and actually challenge the Taliban
08:09to say that, in Islam, there is no justification for a ban on girls' education and for preventing
08:15women from work in the Islamic context.
08:18We should note that this isn't just a human right that's being deprived of women. It's
08:22a right that's really hurting the Afghan economy as well, where so many women are just
08:26not allowed to contribute. You are, though, contributing, though, through your fund, $1.5
08:32million, as we noted. Explain to us how you and your fund, through this money, are able
08:39to help in any way you can specifically. What are you doing?
08:43When I think about the future of Afghanistan, it's still the women and girls who give me
08:47hope. They are protesting on the streets every day for their right to an education, to work,
08:53to political representation, and to a public life. That's why we are supporting Afghan
08:57activists on the ground. Malala Fund is announcing $1.5 million additional funding to organizations,
09:0413 organizations in Afghanistan who are working on the front line to advocate for girls' right
09:09to an education.
09:11And we're also, at the same time, supporting the campaign and the movement led by Afghan
09:15women to end to recognize gender apartheid and to end it, and to hold the Taliban to
09:20account for committing these crimes, and to push leaders and to hold them account as well
09:27to ensure that they also take steps.
09:31It was in 2013, some 11 years ago, when you were 16, that you spoke before the U.N. And
09:36here's what you said. You said, peace is necessary for education. We see there's way too much
09:41suffering and war happening right now as we speak. There are two big hot wars in Ukraine
09:47and in Gaza there.
09:49And I know that you have recently announced a new graduate program and scholarship for
09:53Palestinians at Oxford University. Just talk to us about this mission for you and the hope
10:03that you would like to give Palestinian women, children, in terms of their efforts to go
10:10to school, to go back to school, because, obviously, that can't happen right now.
10:14First of all, I think we need to remind all of us that what is happening in Gaza to Palestinian
10:21people, to Palestinian children, is horrifying. More than 80 percent of the schools have been
10:26damaged. Almost all universities have been bombed in this bombing by Israel.
10:30So, when I think about any war, any crisis in the world, I think about children. These
10:35wars take away their dreams, their future. I want girls to be in a classroom. I want
10:41children to be studying, to be dreaming about their future, to be playing outside on their
10:46streets. War and conflicts and oppression takes all of that away from children.
10:52We are seeing that happening in Afghanistan. We are seeing these things happening in Sudan
10:57and in Gaza. This has to stop. And, again, I want our leaders to think about the children,
11:01to think about humanity, and to take a brave step towards peace.
11:07And the same I'm hoping for Afghanistan as well, that it has been 1,000 days. I cannot
11:12imagine that it's 2,000 days, 3,000 days. We cannot keep Afghan girls waiting.
11:19And I want to reiterate that it's so important for us to stand with Afghan women and girls.
11:23They are at the forefront of this campaign. So I'm here to share my empathy and to share
11:28my solidarity with them, to all the activists in the world who are speaking about peace,
11:33of justice.
11:34Yes. Malala, I can't think of a better spokesperson for this issue and your bravery and your continued
11:40fight for this very, very important mission, educating women, educating girls, giving them
11:46the rights that they deserve. Malala Yousafzai, thank you so much for joining the program
11:50today.
11:51Thank you.
11:53And freedom remains also elusive for the many hostages still held in Gaza by Hamas. Some
11:58of them are from the Nova Music Festival, where an event dedicated to peace and love
12:02became the scene of a massacre by Hamas militants on October 7th. Now, an exhibition in New
12:08York aims to take viewers through what happened that day, presenting them with remains salvaged
12:14from the festival grounds.
12:16Ofer Amir is a survivor of that attack. He is also one of the founders of the festival
12:20and has helped produce this exhibition. In the wake of protests this week outside the
12:25exhibit, including people calling for intifada, Ofer gave me a tour and explained the importance
12:32of remembering.
12:33One of the most powerful parts of this exhibit are just the belongings that no one came to
12:39claim, from hats and bags, as you see here, soccer balls, water bottles, to clothing items,
12:52and then ultimately the shoes. I think for so many people it's very reminiscent of what
12:57they see at the Holocaust Museum. And just, it gives you a sense of the scope of what
13:05was lost that day. How did this come about?
13:10Well, you know, everything that you see here, from all the belongings, and the tents, and
13:18the chairs, and with the help of the police, we managed to gather all of these belongings
13:26and when you see the shoes, it's clear. It's reminding us exactly of what happened to us
13:36a hundred years ago at the Holocaust. And people were running away and left everything
13:45behind, even their shoes. And I was one of the last people to leave the festival area.
13:51And we saw the tents broken, and we saw their belongings and bags, and I was asking myself,
13:57how could someone run away without their bag? But when terrorists are shooting at you, you
14:04just leave everything behind.
14:06How many of the survivors have been here?
14:09We had, I'd say, over 50 of the survivors coming here and being part of the team and
14:15telling their story.
14:16And you've really encompassed a multi-sensory feeling and exhibit here.
14:23This is exactly the feeling that we wanted to give everyone that goes through this journey,
14:27the feel, the smell. And we also explain to everyone that is entering this exhibition,
14:34it's not like a museum where you cannot touch anything. You want people to touch the tents
14:39and the belongings to get the sense of what we went through.
14:46And this is the wall honoring all the victims.
14:48Yeah.
14:50How many in total?
14:51Three hundred and...
14:52Four hundred and one.
14:53Four hundred and one.
14:54Including the police and the security guards and too many, I know too many faces here.
15:04This was a really good friend of mine, Matan.
15:11And I know, where was he? I just saw him. This is a real hero.
15:17Mataniel, he's a hero. His parents were also here in the first two weeks.
15:23How are you feeling today? Physically?
15:27Physically, it's getting better every day. And I've been working really hard on recovering.
15:36I was shot in both of my legs and my right leg was paralyzed for a few weeks. My mission
15:42was always to get better as fast as I can because my daughter was born four weeks after.
15:48You were one of the founders of the Nova Festival. You were there on October 7th, where sadly
15:54over 350 partygoers, concertgoers, music attendees lost their lives, were slaughtered. You're
16:01one of the lucky ones to be alive. Your wife was nine months pregnant, so she wasn't there
16:06with you. Walk us through that day.
16:09Well, 6-29 is when the rocket started. And I remember the first moment we were looking
16:16at the sky and it was like hundreds of rockets. And the first feeling was, OK, I was standing
16:28next to me, another producer was standing next to me, and we were looking at each other.
16:33And you don't want to believe that it's happening. There's like this feeling of hope that, OK,
16:39we have the Iron Dome. Unfortunately, when you live in Israel, you know rockets. And
16:45I'm telling him, we have Iron Dome, that they will not shut us down.
16:51You wanted the concert to still go. You didn't understand the scope and the magnitude of
16:55the attack.
16:56We had no idea. We had no idea. And at around 8 o'clock in the morning, this is when, yeah,
17:04this is when the first time we understood, OK, it's real. We saw them coming with their
17:09pickup trucks, like four pickup trucks.
17:12The Hamas terrorists, yeah.
17:14And we understand that they're surrounding us. And they came with the pickup trucks and
17:17heavy machine guns. And then they start shooting into the crowd. The bullets are hitting next
17:22to us. And you can hear them. You can feel them going next to your head.
17:29And so this is the first moment when we understand, OK, this is real.
17:33And...
17:34How long after the rocket started were you shot? How many hours later?
17:39I was shot at around a little bit before 10 o'clock in the morning. So it's about three
17:45and a half hours.
17:46And how long until you were rescued?
17:49After four hours. After I got shot, we managed to, I don't know how, but we managed to escape
17:55the terrorists three times, because they shot us and then they shot us again.
18:00And this exhibit now, which has extended its stay twice in New York City, was initially
18:08literally a lost and found for those survivors, for those family members of the loved ones
18:14to come and claim their clothing, their belongings. How did that evolve into what it is today?
18:23We recreated the festival, the main stage of the festival in Tel Aviv. And so the idea
18:30was for the memorial. And it evolved to, again, for the memorial. And once we opened the doors
18:37in Tel Aviv, we understood after a few days that it's not only for the memorial. We have
18:44such a strong tool in our hand to show the world what happened. There's so much denial
18:49on social media and so much hate.
18:52Did that denial and hate for music lovers who were simply coming to a peaceful concert,
18:59did that surprise you?
19:02Yes. Yes, it surprises me, because a music festival, the dance floor, it's supposed to
19:10be the safest place on earth. It's the place with so much joy. And everyone who comes there
19:16can be whoever they want to be. It's a place of love and freedom and peace. And we were
19:23disappointed that we didn't get the support of the music industry, of even the, we are
19:29part of the global trans music community. And even from some of the major trans music
19:36festivals, they didn't support us. And it's disappointing, because this exhibition, this
19:42festival, it has nothing to do with religion or politics or, because we believe that no
19:48matter where you, when you're in the dance floor and we listen to the same music, we
19:52are the same.
19:53Why do you think that silence exists, that lack of support?
19:59I wish I could answer this. I wish I had an answer for this.
20:04Earlier this week, there were mass protests right outside this exhibit here on Wall Street.
20:09Some of just the unadulterated anti-Semitism. It was quite shocking. People were chanting,
20:15long live the Intifada, Israel go to hell. In one video, a man declares, I wish Hitler
20:21was still here. He would have wiped you, Jewish people, all out.
20:27Something a lot of people have spoken out against. The mayor of New York City called
20:31it despicable. What was going through your minds when you heard those chants outside?
20:36Well, I'm not surprised they came here to demonstrate, because I've been here in New
20:44York for the past two months, and I hear in the news and see these demonstrations at colleges
20:49and what's going on all over the United States. And there's so much lack of education. And
21:01sometimes I feel sorry for them, because when you ask them one question, where is Israel,
21:06they don't even know where Israel is. Because we've been talking to some protesters before.
21:11There were a group of five or a group of two in the last weeks, and we approached them
21:16and told them, listen, come and look for yourself. Come look inside what you're protesting against.
21:22There's no interest of communication from their side. And well, in some kind of way,
21:34it breaks my heart that there's so much hate out there, because we are exactly the opposite.
21:38I say we, the festival producers and the NOVA founders, but also as an Israeli and as a Jew,
21:46we don't hate. We don't want this hate. We don't hate back.
21:49We're now over eight months into this horrific war. There's been so much tragedy and innocent
21:58life lost, obviously in Israel, and subsequently in Gaza amongst civilians there. I'm just
22:05wondering for you, as someone who embraces peace, how have the past eight months been for you?
22:13Well, we're dealing with so much in the last eight months since October 7. I almost got
22:23murdered. We focus on the good. We focus on the light. It's not easy to live in Israel. It's not
22:28easy that you hear in the news every few days more soldiers that have been killed or Palestinians
22:36that died out of the consequences. And this is not what we want. And well, we are not politicians
22:46or anything, but it's easy. Give back the hostages and it will be over.
22:51Four of them, as you know, were thankfully rescued alive this past weekend. And they were
23:01Nova music fans. They were attending the Nova music festival. And yet you also hear from top
23:09military officials that there's no way they can replicate these types of hostage rescues.
23:17How important is it for you that an end to this war come, that a ceasefire deal be reached?
23:23Well, I can tell you last Saturday when we got the news of the four hostages,
23:29well, I was surprised that the feeling that went through my body and I was like the whole country
23:35was crying and so emotional and so happy that they came back. And then you have these thoughts,
23:42what they've been through in the last eight months. It's unthinkable. And of course,
23:48we want the war and the ceasefire to happen as fast and as soon as possible. It helps no one,
23:56this war.
23:57Can't put to words the emotions you feel when you walk through this. You really replicated that
24:01night at the festival. It's really breathtaking in some of the most horrific ways imaginable.
24:08And finally, you end up here in what you called the healing room.
24:12Why was it important for you to end this tour on a positive note?
24:17It's because this is part of our journey. And the exhibition is telling our story. It's
24:24from the light to the darkness and then to the light again. And this is what this healing room
24:29is all about. And the day after, like I mentioned, we opened our healing facility. And since then,
24:35we opened a foundation that is dealing with the survivors, with the families of the victims.
24:43And this became our purpose in life right now. And we are doing everything in our power
24:50to heal our community. And the sentence, we will dance again. I promise you that we will dance
24:57again. And we should note the exhibition has now been extended until June 22nd in New York
25:03and is going to Los Angeles next. Well, we turn to India now where Prime Minister Narendra Modi
25:10is coming to terms with his shock election result, having lost his majority in parliament.
25:15Unrivaled for a decade, he's now been forced into a coalition with regional parties who are
25:20opposed to the caste system, a notorious social hierarchy that has for centuries allowed for
25:25rampant discrimination. Dalits, once known as untouchables, the very lowest and most oppressed,
25:32decided Modi had not done enough to ease their poverty-stricken lives.
25:36To understand just how bad things are for them, we turn to Krishnan's report from 25 years ago,
25:42when the seeds of this political awakening were sown.
25:45And a warning, some of this report is extremely difficult to watch.
25:49Sometimes, the smallest detail can reveal the whole picture. These untouchable villagers are
25:57taking their shoes off, not because they want to, but because they have to. They're about to pass
26:04their upper caste neighbors, sitting here in the shade. It's a daily ritual of petty humiliation.
26:11The untouchables can only wear their shoes again when they reach their own part of town.
26:17Why are you guys always taking off your shoes and putting them back on again?
26:22If we don't take our shoes off, we'll be fired from our jobs.
26:27We'd like to stand up to them, but we know we don't have a chance.
26:31Have you ever been punished for anything here?
26:34They've punished us several times. We have to fall at their feet two or three times.
26:41They have to fall at their feet?
26:45We have to lie on the ground and beg forgiveness.
26:48Oh my goodness.
26:51And the discrimination continues at prayer.
26:55Untouchables aren't allowed to enter the Hindu temple in this village,
26:59so the priest blesses them outside.
27:02In tea houses all over India, untouchables have to drink from separate glasses.
27:11And they have to wait until someone comes to serve them outside.
27:16Even access to clean water is determined according to caste.
27:21Untouchables can't use this public well,
27:24because even their touch would pollute the water, says this upper caste villager.
27:32These customs have been practiced forever,
27:35and if the government passed new laws against it,
27:37nothing would change, and I personally don't believe it should.
27:42This is where Rangamma, an untouchable woman, was forced to get her water.
27:47A muddy pond polluted by animal faeces.
27:51Rangamma's encounter with a pig proves just how dirty this water is.
27:57Did a lot of people get sick from drinking the bad water?
28:02Yes, and when our children became sick, the doctors blamed us,
28:06saying you people are unclean.
28:11After enduring years of this kind of discrimination,
28:14Rangamma and her friends took up the fight.
28:17It began with a small act of defiance.
28:21One day, they decided to take clean water from the public well.
28:25But they were stopped by infuriated upper caste villagers,
28:29and even worse, their own husbands were too afraid to support their cause.
28:36All the women in the village, we decided that if our men didn't help us get clean water,
28:40we wouldn't cook for them.
28:42And so, four days later, they joined our fight.
28:47Rangamma and her friends created such an uproar
28:50that eventually, the upper caste in this village were forced to back down.
28:54Now, we have clean water, and water is life.
29:13The caste system is as old as the stones that built this temple.
29:18India's segregation is cemented in nearly 3,000 years.
29:24It's a system that's been around for the last 30 years of religion, not law.
29:30It's one of the most complicated, sophisticated systems of social hierarchy and oppression
29:36that the world has ever, that human beings have ever devised.
29:39Professor Sunil Kirlani teaches politics at the University of London.
29:44He's the author of an acclaimed book on contemporary India
29:48and the complex legacy of the caste system.
29:50It's a system that ranks every Hindu from the highest to the lowest
29:54according to the work they and their caste perform.
29:58Purity is an extremely important facet of religious observance.
30:05For example, the use of fire, which is very common in Hindu rituals, or the use of water.
30:10There's a very strong sense of certain objects,
30:14certain things being taboo, that you don't come into contact with them.
30:20For instance, the dead.
30:23Traditionally, it's the untouchables who prepare the corpses for cremation.
30:28They were those castes who performed the work that no one else in the society would do,
30:33such as dealing with the bodies of the dead, etc.
30:38This was seen as work that somehow was profaning, that was impure.
30:43The untouchables are considered so unclean that traditionally,
30:47not even their shadows were supposed to defile these temples.
30:51And today, they are still relegated to the very worst that life has to offer.
30:57Like Narayanama, she's been using her bare hands to clean public toilets for the past 19 years.
31:06They look down at me and say,
31:10They look down at me and it hurts my soul.
31:15Narayanama's family has been assigned this filthy job for generations,
31:20and for generations, it's made them physically ill.
31:24In big cities, they may escape the abuses they endured in the small villages,
31:29but often, their only choice will be to settle in slums,
31:33where no one else would even think of living.
31:35Henry Tiffine is a local human rights worker.
31:38Oh, good lord.
31:41Is this the toilet river?
31:43You see the man walking across it?
31:44Yeah.
31:45He's walking basically through an open sewer.
31:47Open sewer, it's all open sewer.
31:49Kids are playing in this sewer.
31:51That's normal.
31:52That's normal.
31:53That's normal.
31:54That's normal here.
31:55That's normal for an untouchable.
31:56Yes.
31:57And these are the sanitary workers of the town.
32:00The sanitary workers of the town?
32:02What, the people who clean the latrines and things?
32:04Who clean the latrines, who clean the streets.
32:07Now that, that is truly disgusting, the latrine business.
32:11I mean, how people can accept to clean public toilets with their hands is beyond me.
32:19And increasingly, India's 200 million untouchables are resisting,
32:25through the power of the ballot and political protest.
32:28And it's changing the face of India.
32:31Caste as a form of social imprisonment is beginning to break down, I think.
32:39It's beginning to break down.
32:41People are beginning to assert their rights.
32:43They are beginning to say, well look, constitutionally, this is illegitimate.
32:47These are my rights as an Indian citizen.
32:55They are rights that were enshrined in India's constitution,
32:59which banned discrimination against untouchables.
33:02Progress has been difficult.
33:04But now, for the first time in history,
33:07an untouchable has managed, through his own efforts,
33:10to become president of India, though the office is largely symbolic.
33:16But it's the local untouchable leaders, like Dr. Krishna Swamy,
33:21who are really shaking up the system,
33:23by building a political movement on centuries of pent-up anger.
33:28Is India a democracy for all?
33:30No, it is a fake democracy.
33:33We are fighting for our self-respect.
33:36Some local officials have been killed. Are you not afraid?
33:40There are thousands and thousands of people ready for this fight.
33:46Almost every time untouchables assert their rights,
33:49it provokes violence in the cities,
33:51and especially in the countryside,
33:53where upper-caste landlords still reign over their untouchable laborers.
34:01That's what happened in the village of Bhate one night.
34:05More than 200 upper-caste men, armed with guns and knives,
34:09attacked this village.
34:11They went from hut to hut, killing anyone they could find, even children.
34:15And all these villagers had been asking for
34:18And all these villagers had been asking for was what they considered a fair wage,
34:23one dollar's worth of rice a day, for their work in the fields.
34:28This is what they got for their trouble, unspeakable horror.
34:32The bodies of 58 villagers haphazardly sprawled where their killers found them.
34:38Whole families were murdered, including Parwati Devi's son and his wife.
34:43Only her grandson survived, hidden in his dead mother's dress.
34:49There was no reason to kill my son.
34:52He never argued with anyone.
34:55Like all of us, he just worked in the fields for his daily wage.
35:00A pittance of a wage paid by the landlords who own these fields,
35:05and who now are accused of leading the slaughter.
35:09Mohan Chaudhary is the upper-caste village priest.
35:15We never start the violence.
35:17It's the untouchables who pick the fight, and the landlords just retaliate.
35:25So in this part of India, untouchables are arming themselves.
35:29Only women are allowed in this militia.
35:32They're being trained to shoot because they are most at risk.
35:39Nobody else will protect us.
35:40That's why I carry my own gun.
35:43Recently, a young girl was kidnapped and raped by the landlords.
35:49There's more violence every day, and the police don't help us.
35:55Sister Sudha is trying to help, but she uses the law.
36:00She's an attorney and a Catholic nun,
36:03who chooses to live with and defend the very lowest castes.
36:08When you see untouchables, men or women,
36:11cleaning human excrement with their hands,
36:14being forced to drink from separate cups in tea rooms,
36:19having to take off their shoes when they walk past an upper caste,
36:23is there a sense of outrage?
36:26For sure. It's really a curse on humanity, the whole caste system.
36:32Is there any escape?
36:34Impossible.
36:36See, in India, everyone knows his caste.
36:41So no matter how well you do in life,
36:45you will always be considered an untouchable,
36:49unclean, and less than human.
36:52Right.
36:54The untouchables' burden has been carried from generation to generation.
37:00Now, Narayanamma, the toilet cleaner, pleads that it not be passed on any further.
37:08All I'm begging for is that my children don't inherit this job.
37:13It should end with me.
37:15It should end with me, an important reflection back there from Christiane.
37:20Well, now decades later, still fighting for self-respect,
37:23the Dalit vote helped change the fate of India.
37:27Turning to our next story, how would you feel about reverting back to a lifestyle
37:31of the late 18th century?
37:33Well, that's exactly what our next guest, AJ Jacobs, did,
37:36as he documents in his new book, The Year of Living Constitutionally,
37:40one man's humble quest to follow the Constitution's original meaning.
37:44And he joins Hari Sreenivasan to discuss what he learned from his experience.
37:50AJ Jacobs, thanks so much for joining us.
37:52Your new book is called The Year of Living Constitutionally,
37:56one man's humble quest to follow the Constitution's original meaning.
38:01Why do this?
38:02Why now?
38:04Well, first, thanks for having me and good morrow.
38:07I decided to do this because I wanted to explore
38:11what the Constitution actually says and how should we interpret it.
38:16And as you probably know, in the last couple of years,
38:19the Supreme Court, the conservative majority,
38:22has embraced something called originalism,
38:24which says the most important thing when interpreting the Constitution
38:28is what did it mean when it was written 230 years ago?
38:32Okay, so how does an author get themself into the mindset
38:35of the writers of the Constitution in the 1700s?
38:40Well, I did everything to express my Second Amendment rights.
38:45I bore a musket around New York City, an 18th century musket,
38:49and I got some strange looks.
38:52Is that legal, by the way?
38:53Wasn't there a law that actually went out to the courts
38:57on whether or not it's legal for you to be carrying a firearm?
39:00It's a gray area.
39:01It's a bit of a gray area.
39:02Yeah, luckily, I wasn't arrested.
39:04In addition to the musket, I wanted to express my First Amendment rights.
39:09So I got off social media and I wrote pamphlets with a quill pen.
39:14So the idea was to go back to the origins and express my rights
39:18the way that they were written,
39:21using the technology and mindset of the founding fathers.
39:24And it was fascinating.
39:25It was an entertaining and fascinating year,
39:27but I hope it had some serious points as well.
39:30Yeah, so tell me, I mean, were you kind of a constitutional nerd before this?
39:35Were you trying to kind of lay out and prove a point in the first place?
39:39Well, I was actually embarrassingly ignorant of the Constitution.
39:46I learned that 60% of Americans have never read the Constitution
39:50from start to finish, and I was one of those 60%.
39:55But it has such a massive impact on how we live our lives
39:59with the Supreme Court ruling on women's rights and gay rights and gun policy.
40:06I thought I need to understand this Constitution.
40:10So I talked to dozens of actual constitutional nerds and law scholars
40:16from all over the political spectrum, but I also wanted to live it.
40:21That's what I did for a previous book that you and I talked about a long time ago
40:25called The Year of Living Biblically.
40:27I find that walking the walk and talking the talk and wearing the tricorn hat
40:32and eating the mutton actually helps me to understand and get in the mindset.
40:37That was part of the goal as well.
40:39Okay, so what were, I guess, the parts of the Constitution that leapt out at you
40:46in terms of how much they have changed in how we live with them today
40:53versus how the authors intended them to be at the time?
40:58Such a great question, and that's sort of the heart of the book.
41:02It was a shockingly different time.
41:04The past is a foreign country, and I'll give you just two quick examples,
41:09the First and the Second Amendment.
41:10So the First Amendment back then was much more constrained.
41:15I love the First Amendment.
41:16Free speech, I'm a big fan, but I'm a fan of modern free speech.
41:21Back at the founding, it wasn't quite Stalinist Russia,
41:25but there were laws against obscenity, against blasphemy.
41:30Sedition was much more cracked down upon,
41:33and we don't want to go back to that original meaning of the First Amendment,
41:38neither conservatives nor progressives,
41:40because the First Amendment would not allow for political contributions,
41:44unlimited political contributions to candidates.
41:48So that's an example of one that's very different.
41:50And the Second Amendment, the technology was so vastly different.
41:54I mean, I went and I shot a musket,
41:58and it is 15 steps to shoot a musket.
42:00It is, you got to take out the ramrod, pour in the gunpowder, put back the ramrod.
42:07It's like building a desk from Ikea.
42:10It takes a while.
42:11So it is a vastly different machine.
42:14And the question is, should there be regulations
42:17that are different because it is so different?
42:20And it's not something, a musket would be very hard to do a mass shooting
42:25with a musket because it takes so long to load.
42:28You know, this idea of updating with the times,
42:30we see that tension being played out pretty much
42:34every time there's a verdict from the Supreme Court.
42:36We have people arguing on the losing side.
42:39This is not what the Constitution was for.
42:42Right.
42:42And it continues to be at the heart of the controversy.
42:47And the question is, how much should you update?
42:51Even originalists would say, for instance, that the law,
42:57the rule against unreasonable searches and seizures.
43:01Originally, that meant the constable banging down the door to search your papers.
43:06But now they say, yes, it does apply to the Internet and iPhones.
43:10But it's inconsistent.
43:12When do you update and when do you not?
43:15So a hardcore originalist like Clarence Thomas would say
43:19that the 14th Amendment, which guarantees equal protection and due process,
43:24when that was written after the Civil War, it did not apply to gay people or gay marriage.
43:29So he would argue that does not cover the constitutional right.
43:33Whereas those who are on the other side,
43:35often called living constitutionalists or pragmatists, would say, no,
43:40you have to update the morals as well.
43:43With the times, the morals change and gay people should be protected by the 14th Amendment.
43:49One of the concerns that you have with the side that says,
43:53go ahead and interpret this document and keep evolving it, is where does that slide stop?
44:00The experts that you've spoken to, how do they figure out how to modify that level of change
44:08so it's still consistent to what should be the values of our country?
44:12Right. That is a huge issue and a tough one.
44:16And I don't have a simple answer.
44:18One idea is that the founders would be shocked that these Supreme Court justices have so much power.
44:27That was not their vision.
44:29Most of them, they thought that the Supreme Court should weigh in on judicial review,
44:35but not what's called judicial supremacy, where they have the final word.
44:40And in the past, the president and Congress would also weigh in on what is constitutional.
44:47So in that case, you wouldn't have this extreme power with just these nine unelected justices.
44:55And I like that.
44:57Another issue is that it's so hard to change the Constitution.
45:03The founders did not anticipate it would be this hard to change.
45:07They wanted it hard to change, but they didn't see this static two-party system coming
45:13when it is impossible to get 60% or 66% of the Congress to agree on the color of the sky.
45:20The key is pluralism, which is a very founding fathers idea.
45:25So you balance the original meaning with the consequences,
45:29with the legitimacy of the Supreme Court and their reputation.
45:33You have all these factors when you make a decision.
45:36One of the things that you did in your constitutional year of life,
45:43you've exercised your right to redress, to petition.
45:45What were you petitioning for?
45:47Well, this was interesting.
45:48Yes, petitions, first of all, First Amendment right, they're often overlooked.
45:53And I thought, I need to do it the old way.
45:55I'm not going to do it the slacktivism way on the Internet.
45:59So I got out a big roll of paper and had people sign with a quill pen.
46:05Now, my petition was because I'm concerned about the president.
46:11Both Democrat and Republican presidents have way too much power.
46:14The founders would be shocked by the war powers and trade powers.
46:19So I went back to an idea from the founding fathers during the Constitutional Convention.
46:26When someone brought up the idea of a single president,
46:29several of the delegates said, are you jesting?
46:32That's a terrible idea.
46:33We just fought to get rid of a king.
46:35Why would we want a single president?
46:37Let's have three presidents, three co-presidents.
46:40Let's have 12 presidents.
46:42Ben Franklin wanted a council of 12 presidents.
46:44And I thought this is an interesting idea.
46:47So I brought a petition to Congress, to Senator Ron Wyden in Washington.
46:53I was wearing my tricorn hat, my regimental coat, buckled shoes, the whole thing.
46:57But he said he would consider it, which I think he meant he would consider it for five seconds.
47:03But he did agree with my general thesis, which is the president is too powerful.
47:08And we have in the future possible presidents who are going to be more authoritarian.
47:16So we do need to constrain the president.
47:19I don't actually think three presidents.
47:21I don't know if Biden, Trump, and RFK Jr.
47:25co-working in the Oval Office is a great idea.
47:27But there are ways to constrain the president that we need to look into
47:32and give power back to the Congress, which is what the founders wanted.
47:36You know, you did take a couple of opportunities here to try and
47:41make this exploration a little positive and fun.
47:45Tell us about election cakes.
47:47Well, this was my favorite part of the book.
47:49And it's a through line of the book.
47:52We don't want to go back to the 18th century voting.
47:55Of course, it was sexist and racist.
47:58And but there are elements of 18th century life that are worth looking at again.
48:03And one of them is the idea that elections for the privileged few who are allowed to vote
48:09were festive.
48:11They were this new right that was awe inspiring.
48:14So it was there were parades.
48:17There was music.
48:18There was a lot of rum punch.
48:20It wasn't quite Coachella or Burning Man, but it was exciting this election day.
48:26And it reminded people of the awesome power of democracy.
48:31So I thought, this is lovely.
48:34Let's try to restart this appreciation of election day as something festive.
48:41And one of the traditions was election cake.
48:43People would bake election cakes, sometimes huge.
48:46One recipe calls for 14 pounds of butter and 10 pounds of sugar.
48:52So I didn't do that.
48:52But I made a big election cake.
48:55And I went on Facebook, which I know is not 18th century, although it is one of the older
49:00platforms.
49:01And I got people from all over America to bake election cakes and bring them to the
49:08polls and give them out to remind people our catchphrase was democracy is sweet.
49:14And I love that because it was it's such an unrelentingly negative time in politics to
49:20have this one positive moment.
49:22And there is evidence, there are studies that say having a festive election day increases
49:29voter turnout.
49:31Australia has something called the democracy sausage, where they have big barbecues.
49:37So I love the election cake.
49:41It's not the end.
49:42We also have to fix gerrymandering and voter suppression.
49:48But let's start with election cakes and get people excited again about the right to vote.
49:54And I'm doing it again in November.
49:56What did this project teach you about yourself?
49:59Especially, you know, we have had so many different conversations on this program about
50:04digital detoxing and slowing down.
50:06And I imagine that has to do something to your brain when you are writing in such a
50:12slow format with a quill and ink.
50:15Exactly.
50:15That was one of my favorite parts is I wrote much of the book with a quill.
50:21And what I found is it changed the way I thought, which was fascinating, because there were
50:28no pings and dings or temptations from the internet.
50:33And I could actually focus.
50:35And I think that I don't think everyone needs to go back to quilts.
50:41But I think writing and thinking offline is so crucial.
50:45And it allowed me to, I think, see the world in a more subtle way.
50:51And one of the big the other big takeaway for me was that it allowed me to see the other
51:00side a little more.
51:02I think we are nowadays so stuck in our opinions, so intransigent and unwilling to look at the
51:10evidence and see the other side.
51:12And this is not a patriotic way of looking at the world.
51:17The founders were very cognitively flexible.
51:21Ben Franklin said that the older he gets, the less certain he is of his opinions.
51:26And what's the ripple effect on the people around you, your family that has to live with
51:32a guy who is, I don't know, writing with a quill and doing things by candlelight and
51:38waking up early in the morning, trying to be back in the 1700s.
51:41How do your kids feel about that?
51:45They are split.
51:47One of them actually likes it.
51:49The other two are so embarrassed.
51:50They walk 40 feet in front of me.
51:53My wife, parts of it she likes.
51:55She loves history.
51:57She did not like the smell of beef tallow candles, which smell like rotten meatloaf,
52:02in her opinion.
52:03Also, there are some very awkward, if you're following 18th century law, it's very sexist.
52:09So married women, for instance, were not allowed to sign contracts.
52:13And my wife owns an event business where she signs several contracts a day.
52:17And I said, well, while I'm doing this experiment, maybe I should take over the site.
52:22At first, she said, great.
52:24I hate signing these contracts.
52:25I was so bad at it.
52:27She fired me after an hour.
52:29So that did not work out for either of us.
52:32You point out that this is the oldest constitution that's around.
52:36So I wonder, what should we be thinking about in terms of, I guess, just surveying the landscape
52:43and seeing what's out there, what could be better, what we do right, what could we improve
52:50on 2.0, 3.0?
52:52Right.
52:52Well, I love that.
52:53And I think it's fascinating because ours was the first modern constitution.
52:59And we didn't have a lot of data of what works and what doesn't.
53:03And I think some Americans think that it's almost unpatriotic to look at other democracies
53:10and how they have structured it and what works for them and what doesn't.
53:14Others, like Justice Breyer, who retired, he was very interested in how foreign democracies
53:20worked.
53:21And I think I agree with Justice Breyer.
53:25Let's look at what is working and what is not.
53:28One thing that I don't think is working for us is the two-party system.
53:33And I don't think the founders wanted a two-party system.
53:35But you look at many European democracies, and they have six or eight parties.
53:41There seems to be a Goldilocks zone of about, I think it's about four to eight parties
53:46is the best.
53:47Because, yes, now we have such polarization that it's so hard to get anything passed.
53:54We were the first, and we can be proud of that.
53:56But we also were at a disadvantage because we didn't know, we didn't have data on what
54:01works and what doesn't.
54:02Are you concerned for our democracy in 2024 today, as we're having this conversation,
54:10after you have engaged in this year-long experiment of living constitutionally?
54:15Well, yes.
54:17But I'm more optimistic than I was when I started.
54:20Part of the whole project was to figure out, can we save democracy?
54:26Because it does seem endangered around the world.
54:29And several things gave me hope.
54:30I'll just give you two of them.
54:32One is, just reading about the history, the founders faced unbelievable odds that they
54:39were going against the strongest army in the world, the British, and that they somehow
54:43were able to make a break and be independent.
54:48That's astounding.
54:49So we have terrible odds against us now, huge problems.
54:52But they're not insurmountable.
54:55The second part is that we have made progress.
54:59If you look at the Constitution itself, you can see the progress in the amendments.
55:05So Black people got the vote.
55:08Women got the vote.
55:09Indigenous people got the vote.
55:1018-year-olds got the vote.
55:12So we are, the arc does point towards justice.
55:16And there is backsliding.
55:18And there's, it's not a straight line.
55:21But I do believe that if we roll up our sleeves, democracy won't save itself.
55:26But I do believe if we roll up our sleeves and make some of these reforms, that democracy
55:31can continue to thrive.
55:33A.J.
55:34Jacobs, thanks so much for joining us.
55:35Thank you.
55:36It was a delight.
55:37And that is it for now.
55:38Thank you so much for watching, and goodbye from New York.