Lifestyle

Meet The Man Keeping Thousands of Families Safe: Justin Hermann

Published

4 years ago

July 23, 2021

Family safety shouldn’t be a choice but a priority for everyone. One of the ways of ensuring family safety is by ensuring there is financial stability in the family. Most employers are now providing life insurance coverage for their employees. Supplemental life insurance is bridging the shortfall in coverage and providing added protection for families.

Justin Hermann is already at the top of the game. He helps serve working families through supplemental life insurance benefits that their unions/associations have endorsed for their members to fill in the gaps of what they can’t get through work and provide them with what they need even after they leave or retire. He leads an agency in a regional leadership position in more than ten states and is on a mission to protect and serve 80,000+ working families a year by 2030.

Changing Paths

Justin is an alumnus of Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity ASU. He pursued a Bachelor of Science in Construction Management. Additionally, Justin started his career with leading technical builders helping build hospitals as a project engineer. However, three months later, he found a new passion.

Justin wanted to serve families and help them acquire financial stability. He understood that he had to focus on his goal and work hard for him to be successful. Success doesn’t just happen; you create it. He wanted to become successful by becoming a better person professionally. Within the first year, Justin had already made six figures in an industry he had not studied for. He was also helping others achieve the six-figure mark.

Helping Families

During the first month of his new career, Justin learned his way around the business. He moved to the leadership position in his second month, and in the third month, he led in sales as a top 5 producer for their AZ, NM, TX agency. It was during his third month that he helped a 22-year-old couple. He processed a death claim for their child that he had seen three weeks prior. This encounter helped him find a purpose for what he was doing for families.

A year later, Justin was working at a regional level with an agency whose vision was expansion. In the second year, he helped open two more offices, where he moved to Texas to help lead. Justin earned a spot on the board of directors. These ranks positioned Justin to serve families better. Justin’s company understands that claims need to be paid fast, people who need the services served, and families provided for.

Justin’s Strategies

Justin puts people first. He ensures he offers professional client services. He has learned to overcome his obstacles and trust the process for his success. What distinguishes him from the rest in the industry is that his technical skills are excellent, allowing him to best understand what families need. He always brings a competitive spirit to the table. And guess what? Justin is working for the number one life insurance company in North America with more policies in place than any other company, allowing him and his team to build lifetime renewals that are rare to find in his industry and or any industry. This ensures a balance between client/agent relationship and company/agent/client relationship where everyone wins and has support now and in the future.

You can connect with Justin here.

Lifestyle

Confronting Propaganda: Street Smart Documents Honest Reactions to Gaza Indoctrination Footage

Published

1 day ago

November 6, 2025

Michelle Langton

Photo Courtesy of: Street Smart

Byline: Michelle Langton

In a recent project, the Street Smart team gathered 20 strangers and presented them with propaganda footage from Gaza that has circulated widely online but remains largely unfamiliar to many audiences. The aim wasn’t to provoke outrage or test media literacy in a classroom setting. It was to capture raw, unfiltered emotional reactions to material that reveals how narratives are formed at the source. The resulting video offers a candid look at how people process shocking content and how their perceptions shift when they see what is rarely shown on mainstream platforms.

The Structure of the Experiment

The format was simple. Participants were seated and shown a series of clips from Gaza, including children’s programming and broadcasts containing intense ideological messaging. No background information was provided, and viewers were not instructed on how to interpret what they were seeing. After watching, they were asked for immediate reactions.

The footage elicited a wide range of emotions. Some viewers were stunned by the content, admitting they had never seen anything like it before. Others expressed disbelief, questioning why this kind of material isn’t more widely discussed. A few were visibly shaken, saying the experience fundamentally altered their understanding of the situation.

By presenting the footage without narration or added commentary, Street Smart allowed participants’ genuine responses to emerge. The experiment revealed how propaganda can affect an entire generation. It can shock, unsettle, and force people to reconsider their assumptions.

Why This Project Matters

Sage Fox and Dorani aligned the purpose of this experiment with Street Smart’s broader mission of challenging prevailing narratives and encouraging critical thought among younger audiences. In an environment where footage spreads rapidly across digital platforms, propaganda can shape public opinion long before context catches up.

By showing the Gaza Indoctrination footage in a controlled setting and recording uncoached responses, the team aimed to expose the emotional and cognitive impact of this type of content.

“The first reaction is often the most revealing, because it shows how powerful images can be without context.”

The Range of Reactions

While each participant brought their own perspective, several themes emerged. Some expressed sympathy with the imagery itself, saying it was emotionally powerful.

One participant said, “It makes me question what I see online every day. How much of it is shaped this way?”

Their comments highlight how propaganda resonates differently depending on prior knowledge and exposure. Many viewers have simply never encountered such footage directly.

Street Smart’s Approach

This project continues a pattern established by Sage Fox & Dorani’s earlier videos. Rather than relying on experts or lengthy analysis, Street Smart focuses on real people and their honest reactions. The approach is simple but effective. Present potent material, listen to what people say, and share those moments with a wider audience.

The Gaza Indoctrination footage experiment fits this model. It doesn’t attempt to draw final conclusions or offer political commentary. Instead, it documents how people respond when they’re exposed to narratives that are usually filtered through intermediaries.

Implications for Media Literacy

Beyond its viral potential, the video raises broader questions about how people interact with powerful imagery online. Propaganda operates on emotional reflexes. As this experiment shows, those reflexes are often unexamined until they’re brought to the surface.

Sage Fox & Dorani hope that projects like this push audiences to think more critically about what they see and share.

“The purpose is not to tell people what to believe. It is to remind them that every image comes from somewhere, and that source matters,” they said.

Next Steps for Street Smart

As Street Smart’s platform grows, Sage Fox & Dorani plan to conduct similar experiments in different contexts. They intend to use their direct, street-level approach to highlight how people react when presented with challenging material.

The Gaza footage project is one piece of a larger mission. The team uses simple methods to shed light on complex issues. By focusing on authentic reactions, they continue to build a unique space in online media that blends cultural investigation with raw human response.

A Window into Unfiltered Thought

“We showed 20 strangers real propaganda footage from Gaza — and filmed their unfiltered reactions” is not a dramatic exposé or academic study. It is a clear, unmediated record of how individuals respond when confronted with material designed to persuade. In that restraint lies its strength.

By documenting these moments, Street Smart shows how awareness can begin with a pause. A brief space between seeing and believing.