Middle 38 Minutes of "Tell The Truth, Cenk" Online, A Shocking Hasan Clip & What's Next
We continue exploring the media & politics surrounding TYT founder Cenk Uygur's union-busting and reveal [some of] the actual reasons we started a union at The Young Turks.
Thrilled to finally release another 38 minutes of the documentary.
(skip below for a clip of Cenk’s nephew, Hasan Piker, stating his uncle skirted labor regulations and allowed people to steal his ad sales commissions)
The Middle 38 Minutes picks up where the First 46 Minutes leaves off. You might want to watch that first.
It references the New York Times’s smear of Cenk Uygur so for a helpful refresher check out this clip about the Ethical Dark Web. It’s the final five minutes of the first big chunk.
But to summarize: The New York Times reported (also: Mediate coverage) Cenk Uygur's remarks to David Duke during an interview as if it indicated support for David Duke's racism rather than opposition, an obvious and ugly smear that was among the ways Team Cenk experienced unfairness from their establishment foes, provoking rightful outrage from Uygur supporters.
Being lied about by a media outlet that ostensibly should know better is something Cenk seems to have found both hurtful and useful as he would go on to mention it in interviews, fundraisers and speaking engagements, even bringing it up during his 2023-2024 Presidential Campaign. He also refers to the CNN and LA Times pieces published in December 2019 at various times.
The Middle 38 Minutes continues exploring the media and politics of this odd and unique circumstance — a famous progressive talk show host media company CEO running for Congress while aggressively union-busting — but shifts to [some of] the working conditions that drove our interest in forming a union at The Home of Progressives and why we did so in secret. We all had very good reasons, much of which I am not at liberty to divulge, but because my own employment conditions were a core reason, the film begins to share that story. (see next post; working on it)
As you learn what actually happened, you’ll get a sense for why Cenk didn’t want his audience asking the very reasonable question: why did your workers want a union?
The false narrative Cenk Uygur spread that the union originated as a ploy by Nancy Pelosi and her establishment minions wasn’t merely a slanderous lie about his own workers but it, along with the cover-up, served and continues to serve the purpose of preventing, or at least obscuring, inquiry into his employment practices.
In one of his union-busting emails sent to workers, he laments (YouTube link) the loss of his reputation and frets that the world might get the idea that he’s “a boss who treats his employees poorly.”
His emails position himself as the victim in the situation, unfairly maligned as a union-buster despite such a label resulting from his own decision to bust a union, but I’m confident that when you learn that for 12 of 14 months of working full-time as a video editor doing regular company business on the company schedule using company property on the company’s premises under company supervision I received zero company benefits, was classified 3 different ways and was the lowest paid editor to boot, you’ll gain some insight into whether Cenk Uygur's concern he be perceived “as a boss who treats his employees poorly” is founded in his victim complex, or is an actual reality that deserves to be exposed.
This isn’t about slights, nor the generalized disrespect and frustration imbued in all forms of employment. We all hold secret little ugly truths about former employers and how the sausage gets made. The world runs on this silence.
No, this is about crossing ethical lines, catapulting over them, well past decency into realms far beyond what’s fair, just or appropriate.
I have the paperwork to prove everything, BTW.
Also take note of the final sentence of the first paragraph.
“No one ever raised a single issue and then we were suddenly engaged in some sort of trench warfare as if we’re evil management that deprives their employees of the basics.”
Not true. I constantly raised the issue. I was deprived of the basics.
I carried an enormous amount of daily stress. I suppressed an immense amount of frustration. I could only complain so much because I could easily be fired.
And for all that I still gave TYT my best. I’m an excellent video editor and I did very good work for a boss at a very cheap rate ($21.63/hr) who couldn’t even respect me enough to treat me with the same disrespect he had for the other workers.
So I plotted to unionize. That’s what happened.
”Tell The Truth, Cenk” — Documentary Playlist (2 videos, so far)
Playlist — TYT-Related Videos on Winners and Losers
After years of working in private, production on this project is now in a public phase so I’m talking about it on my podcast, (also on Apple/the apps) making clips, answering questions/comments and sharing details about my experience both at TYT as well as the process of making a documentary film.
Hasan On His Working Conditions At TYT
Speaking of clips, I was shocked but not surprised when I came across Hasan Piker, Cenk Uygur’s nephew, famous Twitch streamer and former employee of The Young Turks, on the Chuckle Sandwich podcast saying his uncle used his employment as an opportunity to skirt some serious labor regulations and that ad sales commissions he’d earned were taken from him at the last minute.
Though details remain hidden — come forward, Has! — I very much related to what he went through. He didn’t deserve to be treated like that.
(Video in this post here on Twitter/X)
Solidarity, 'm’i’rite?
Next For Me
Though work on the project began years ago, the past six months have been more twelve hour days than my cat can count. Getting this 2nd large chunk out was like passing a kidney stone. I’m exhausted, relieved and I want everyone to see what I made.
Work now slows as I have to focus on finding income. I’m in tremendous debt to my saint of a roommate, I’m strained by emotional and mental capacities I now understand to be autistic burnout, both my wrists are wracked with wrecked cartilage from a woodworking job (vibrating tools) and like most humans I require food and am terrified of becoming homeless, plus I have an ambition of not dying in elder poverty.
I’m broke af.
I’m already unemployable enough as it is but making a documentary about a former employer such as this is likely fatal to my job search; could you imagine a bigger red flag to a hiring manager?
But with my RAM somewhat cleared, I will be putting out more regular podcasts and clips, using the skills I have as a comedian, talkative know-it-all, animator and video editor to hopefully reach and build an audience that wants to support my work. With enough support, I can focus on completing “Tell The Truth, Cenk.” Ow, my urethra!
Please consider contributing. I’m grateful to anyone who gives me a chance and sees the years of effort here worthy of financial support. Due to my light and noise sensitivities and the downstream emotional eddies of a burnt out nervous system, I do not function well in the world so if I can find my footing with my own output and comradely collabs, I might finally find some peace. Things have been hard. I’ve been scared so long. I don’t know what peaceful rest feels like. My beard fell out.
Other projects will receive some attention as well, such as writing/talking about my late-in-life discovery of being autistic and my efforts to take better care of myself (I’ve let things slip quite a bit while working on the doc) and hopefully get my beard to grow back plus Photoshop/Video Editing tutorials for creatives in a hurry, possibly even offering private lessons. With 20-ish years experience with Adobe, I’ve helped a few friends and always found it satisfying how easily I could identify their knowledge gaps, the stuff that takes years to sort out if you learn the hard lonely way like I did. I have some streaming ideas, too.
Oh, and I have to find a home for the stray cat I took in 18-months ago. She was dying outside my building but I found out the hard way I’m not a cat guy. Even if I was, I can’t afford it. She’s safe here but she deserves better than me.
Thanks for reading.
-Hank