Hey English learners, welcome to another phrasal verb episode.
I hope you're doing great and that you're ready to learn a couple new phrasal verbs today.
We're going to look at two phrasal verbs.
The first one is buy into. and the second one is by off.
So first, let's define these phrasal verbs and hear an example of each one.
So buy into means to agree with something and accept it as valid.
For example, I could say, I didn't buy into their new idea.
What I'm saying here is that I didn't accept their new idea and believe it or agree with it.
They told me their new idea and I said I don't, I don't know about that or no, I don't agree with that.
Something like that.
I didn't buy into their new idea.
And how about buy off?
This means to pay someone so that they don't stop you from doing something dishonest or illegal.
For example, I could say, he bought off the investigators so that they wouldn't reveal the evidence.
In this case I'm saying that the man paid the investigators so that they wouldn't reveal the evidence against him or someone he was protecting.
So he did this and it was dishonest and illegal, right?
So he bought them off.
Okay, now let's talk about a couple different things.
And as I talk, I'm going to use these phrasal verbs again and again so that you hear them in different sentences.
And hopefully, by the end of this episode you'll feel comfortable with these phrasal verbs and be able to use them in your own sentences.
So first, let me tell you a fictional story.
This isn't true.
I want to tell you a fictional story about a time when all the electronic devices in one city stopped working.
This was a crazy occurrence, a crazy event and, of course, different theories emerged as to why this happened.
When something emerges, we're saying that it appears.
So different theories emerged as to why all of the electronic devices in this city stopped working.
So the first theory was that it was a cyber attack.
Someone attacked this city.
Perhaps a foreign entity, a foreign government attacked this city by finding a way to shut down all of its electronic devices.
I didn't quite buy into that theory when I heard it, because why would a foreign government or a foreign entity attack just one, one unimportant city?
This was the main reason why I didn't buy into that, because this city was not a very important city, it was just a random city.
It wasn't Washington DC or New York City.
It was a random city.
So I didn't really buy into the theory that this was a cyber attack because of that fact.
Why would this city be targeted?
And no one could really explain how this cyber attack was done if it was a cyber attack.
So for those reasons, I didn't buy into that.
It's an interesting theory, but for me, it was hard to buy into.
Another theory was the theory that there was some sort of weather phenomenon that caused this to happen.
There might have been some strange weather event that caused all of the electronic devices to stop working.
And I definitely didn't buy into this theory.
There was really no explanation of how the weather could affect this and cause this to happen.
This was a crazy event.
All the electronic devices stopped working.
It's hard for me to buy into the idea that the weather caused this.
This doesn't seem to be a natural thing.
So because of that, I didn't buy into that theory either.
It just seems like something that people thought of because they couldn't think of a better explanation.
So I didn't buy into the weather phenomenon theory.
Of course, there was also the supernatural theory.
This city has a history of some strange things happening.
Some weird unexplained events and unexplained phenomena happening.
And so naturally, people pointed to the supernatural and said that this was some supernatural thing, some curse on the city or something like that.
I didn't buy into this.
I didn't buy into the supernatural theory.
I believed that there was some logical explanation for what had happened and I didn't buy into supernatural theory.
The theory that I did find myself buying into was the government test theory.
So some people theorized that the government was testing something. whatever it might've been.
It was tested in that city and, And this actually makes sense to me.
Governments have been known to test things in public for everyone to see.
There have been different types of tests.
And this sounds kind of like a government test.
So I actually bought into this theory because the other theories didn't quite make sense, perhaps.
Perhaps the cyber attack one was the next best explanation, but again there was no reason why that city should have been targeted, so I didn't buy into that.
So the one I did buy into was the government test theory.
I think that it's the most likely thing.
The government was running some type of test.
Maybe the test went wrong.
Who knows?
Maybe all the electronic devices weren't supposed to stop working, but maybe the test went wrong.
So that's the theory that is the easiest to buy into for me.
All right, now let me talk about something else.
Let me talk about corrupt governments and how they accomplish their goals.
So one common characteristic one common characteristic behavior of corrupt governments is their willingness meaning that they are ready to do this, they are okay to do it and ready to do it their willingness to buy off political candidates.
So when people run for office meaning they try to get elected as a mayor, a congressman governor president, whoever they are often bought off and the government that is in power makes sure that these political candidates are going to uphold, meaning maintain and promote the agenda that government right.
So corrupt governments often buy off political candidates.
Political candidates are constantly bought off, they're bought and paid for, as we say, and they become part of the system.
So even if the political candidates start as honest people, after they're bought off they become part of the corrupt system, and we've seen this time and time again how someone starts their political career with good intentions, but then they're bought off and they become just like all the other politicians.
So that's one way that corrupt governments accomplish their goals.
Another way is by buying off law enforcement.
So if police officers and law enforcement are bought off, then they only enforce the laws that the government wants them to enforce.
They don't enforce the laws that they should enforce.
And they create phony laws or phony rules, meaning fake laws or fake rules that they do enforce because they want to arrest certain people.
When police officers are bought off, they often go after problematic people, problematic groups, people that pose a threat to the government.
And so those people become targets of the government and law enforcement goes after them because they're bought off and they're getting fired, paid by the corrupt government right.
Another way that corrupt governments accomplish their goals is by buying off news companies.
So this is one of the easiest ways for a corrupt government to manipulate people and stay in power.
They buy off news companies.
And once news companies are bought off, they don't report the bad things that the government does.
And they lie about different things people groups, and they slander like they try to lie and say dishonest things about certain people to make people hate them, to make people, Those people's characters seem really bad.
So they slander enemies of the government.
So when the news companies are bought off, this is bad for the people because they don't get honest news.
They don't know what is truly happening in the country because they, The news companies are bought off and they aren't reporting the real news.
They're just lying for the government, right?
And one last way that corrupt governments accomplish their goals is by buying off judges.
So the judges are important people because they make important decisions, important rulings and oftentimes corrupt.
Governments need to buy off these judges so that the judges rule in their favor.
As we say, they make the decisions that are beneficial to the government.
So they buy off judges and then these corrupt judges treat the government's enemies unfairly.
They're unfair towards different individuals.
And so if the judges in a country are bought off, You're not going to get fair rulings.
Everything is going to be corrupt and there is no justice.
Justice is no longer possible because justice The judges are bought off and they're not going to make proper judgments.
They're going to favor the people who bought them off, right?
So That's a big problem, and that is something that corrupt governments do in order to accomplish their goals.
I hope that as I was talking, you were able to hear these phrasal verbs used again and again.
And hopefully you have a good feel for how these phrasal verbs are used and how to use them in your own sentences now.
I wanna remind you that if you need my training to help you understand English when people speak fast, then make sure to sign up for my listening practice seminars.
You can do so by becoming a Listening Time member.
The link to sign up is down below.
And also check out my US Conversations podcast, so that you can practice listening to more than one person talking at normal speed.
I also provide the transcripts for each episode, of course.
And this is also a great way to start your speaking practice, because I talk to English teachers on that podcast and And you can listen to those episodes, see which teachers you like, which ones you can understand, and you can take classes with them.
So that link is also down below.
All right, thank you for listening to this phrasal verb episode and I'll talk to you in the next one.
