Stephen Crowder is a stand-up comic, writer, and podcaster. But he doesn t wear pants. So why does he do it? And why does it make him uncomfortable to do so? And why is it so necessary that he doesn't wear pants to publicize his junk to the entire world? Plus, a look at what it's like to be Stephen Crowder's lawyer. Plus, why he thinks it's appropriate for him not to wear pants, and why it's not appropriate for the rest of us to see his junk. Plus, what does it mean to be a comedian and a podcaster, and how did he get to where he is today? All that and more on this Sunday Special with Steven Crowder, who lacks pants. Shout out to our sponsor, TALKSPACE! Use promo code Shapiro at checkout for $45 off your first month! Use the promo code SHOPSHOP to get a discount code SHAPKEPODCAST at checkout, and get $45 OFF your FIRST MONTH! Shouts out to: and for supporting the show! Thank you so much for all the support you've shown so far, and we really appreciate it. Sincerely. -Shapiro and the Shapiro team. Timestamps: 3:00 - 4:00 5:30 - 6:15 - Why you should wear pants? 7:15 8: Why it's OK to show your junk? 9:20 - Why I don't wear them? 11: I don t wear them in public? 13: Why do I wear them to public service? 16:40 - Is it OK to have them in front of other people? 17:30 18:40 19:10 - What does it matter? 21:00 | I'm not a softie? 22:10 27:30 | I m a comedian? 25:30 Is it appropriate to show my junk in public?? 26: What do you like them in pants in my pants in a way that other than when they can see my ass? 27 - How do they like it? 28:30 What are they wear them better? 29:00 What do they're softies? 30:00 Is he a feminist? 35:00 How do you feel about me?
00:00:00.000Before we began this interview, Steven Crowder was in fact wearing pants.
00:00:03.000He walked into the room not wearing pants to make me specifically uncomfortable.
00:00:06.000Since you haven't plugged my stuff, you've been plugging psychologists at alottacreditmerchstore.com.
00:00:20.000So here we are on the Sunday special with Steven Crowder, who lacks pants.
00:00:24.000And we will get to all of the questions for Steven Crowder.
00:00:26.000We will ask him why, indeed, he feels that it is necessary and appropriate for him not to wear pants and thus to show his junk to the entire world.
00:00:32.000But first, let's talk a little bit about Talkspace, the online therapy company that lets you message a licensed therapist
00:00:51.000You know, I am a big advocate of if you got something on your chest and you need to get it off your chest, you should talk to somebody who knows what they are talking about.
00:00:57.000And that's why you should be talking about everyday challenges at work or at home.
00:01:38.000I'm a big advocate, as I say, of if you need help, talk to somebody and Talkspace can make it happen for you at a fraction of the price to going to a therapist.
00:02:07.000I mean, I'm the one wearing pants, so all I can say is that before we began this interview, Steven Crowder was, in fact, wearing pants.
00:02:12.000He walked into the room not wearing pants to make me specifically uncomfortable because, as most people know, I am deeply uncomfortable with the male body.
00:02:18.000Well, I think you're deeply uncomfortable with the men and women of our armed services because this is what they wear.
00:02:22.000They wear ranger panties, or as they're known, softies.
00:02:26.000If I were more of a patriot, I'd be staring at your junk with more enthusiasm, but apparently I am not.
00:02:41.000Let's jump into what you do for a living, which is supposedly comedy, allegedly.
00:03:03.000You know, but Crowder is sitting here, and people should know, the way that I got to know Stephen Crowder was, in fact, as his lawyer.
00:03:10.000So many, many years ago, we got to know each other because I was recommended to Stephen for some odd reason as somebody who might be able to negotiate a contract.
00:04:22.000I was like, why didn't you tell me before this?
00:04:24.000And then I felt bad, but only a little bit.
00:04:27.000Right, but I didn't launch a lawsuit against you, and that was the beginning of our friendship.
00:04:30.000This was the beginning of our friendship.
00:04:31.000Same thing you did with my Fox News contract early on because, you know, listen, at that point I wasn't really, obviously I wasn't looking for anything special, but I remember I just said, I know some people don't own the rights to their own names.
00:04:50.000It's always good that my legal skill is talked up at the beginning of a show, so I appreciate that.
00:04:54.000Well, Steven is indeed the creator and the host of Louder with Crowder, which is the most successful comedy show on the right, I think, pretty clearly and obviously.
00:05:02.000And he has a second-rate mug, which we've allowed him to actually bring in here, pour his water into.
00:05:06.000Obviously, this right here, the Leftist Tears Hot or Cold tumbler, is far superior
00:05:10.000It's taller, it has more bulk, sort of the reverse of our bodies.
00:06:11.000That's actually, you know, that's a funny story.
00:06:12.000Speaking of Texas, so my half-Asian lawyer, Bill Richmond, SMU law grad, when we did the show at SMU,
00:06:17.000He was in there, he was a part of the show.
00:06:18.000He was in the crowd and we did a parody of Say Anything where he was holding up the boombox and In Your Eyes with Peter Gabriel was playing.
00:06:23.000But he's walking in and there are these protesters on the other side of the street.
00:07:32.000Because anyone out there who knows your background in law, and listen, I despise you, of course, all that, but you are supremely qualified, and it's clear that there was a bias against your political worldview.
00:07:42.000Well, I mean, they pretty much said it right off the bat.
00:07:44.000Yes, but I know you get bothered when people say, well, I didn't get accepted because I was at Schenectady Community College and I bombed out.
00:07:50.000It's like, well, no, it's not because you were conservative.
00:07:51.000It's the same thing with a lot of sort of conservative
00:07:56.000Like, I know every single conservative in the comedy, in the entertainment industry, certainly comedy.
00:08:01.000And a lot of people just say, well, it's because I was right-wing.
00:08:04.000It's like, well, hold on a second, it's because you're not there yet.
00:08:06.000I don't mean to say they're not good, but they're not there yet.
00:08:08.000So in that case, I want people to know that it is entirely legitimate that it was because of your worldview, and probably because you couldn't keep your mouth shut about it.
00:08:14.000Well, so on my resume, the name of my second book was Porn Generation, How Social Liberalism is Corrupting Our Future.
00:08:20.000In one particular interview with Gibson, Dunn, and Crutcher, the partner who was interviewing people, I walked in, before I even sat down or said my name, he said, I walked in the door, I remember this clear as day, and he says, it has always been my contention that conservatives and religious people in general have a Freudian fear of sex.
00:08:50.000In any case, let's get back to the question that you completely avoided here, which was, how did you go from being a giant Canadian to a giant Texan and also, did you always want to do political comedy or did you want to do pure comedy?
00:09:01.000No, I always just wanted to, if you'd have asked me when I was 12 or 13, I would have said, I want to be an Academy Award winning actor.
00:09:06.000Really, that truly would have been my dream.
00:09:08.000I just wanted to act, but I also always loved comedy.
00:09:10.000I started writing stand-up when I was 14.
00:09:12.000To do, actually, the school talent show, which ended up being cancelled, so I just continued writing.
00:09:17.000So the first time I did stand-up, I think I was 17, but I had to cut down from about an hour of material to five minutes.
00:09:24.000The only reason I didn't bomb was because I had so much material to edit back.
00:09:28.000But then when I found out how corrupt, obviously, the Academy is, and that the awards didn't mean a whole lot, I said, OK, what do I want to do?
00:09:33.000I was just talking about this with Dennis Prager not long ago.
00:09:36.000I said, OK, if I can't be an Academy Award winning actor, late night host.
00:09:39.000So it's like, you know, my safety's Harvard.
00:09:42.000And at that point, you know, I don't know, who's your favorite late night host of all time?
00:09:54.000See, I was all about Letterman until later on when he became a grumpy man, but early Letterman, like the Larry Bud Nelman, Rupert's Deli, that was really- You were more sophisticated.
00:10:28.000I always knew I wanted to entertain people.
00:10:30.000And when I saw people like Nick DiPaolo do stand-up, I'd feel bad about myself because I would say, I'm never going to be as good as Nick DiPaolo.
00:10:37.000I'm a good stand-up comedian, but a lot of the things I wanted to do, like impressions, sketches, didn't work on stage.
00:10:43.000And of course, acting, I couldn't incorporate a lot of comedy.
00:11:42.000We have to have two completely unbiased sources for every claim that we make.
00:11:44.000We put them on air, or a leftist source.
00:11:47.000So as a matter of fact, sometimes we'll actually have a source from Daily Wire and I'll be like, we can't use Daily Wire because people will say, Daily Wire is bullcrap.
00:11:53.000So we go to the PubMed study, which you guys just sort of, you know, obviously were summarizing.
00:11:57.000But unfortunately, people will say it's not legitimate because, you know, you're shekels and all that.
00:12:00.000So, yeah, so I feel a tremendous responsibility if people are choosing Louder With Crowder to be their last show before their head hits the pillow.
00:12:09.000I've always said this to people who work for me.
00:12:13.000Assume that everyone walking in is walking in for the first time, and they've never seen your prior performances, and earn it.
00:12:18.000Earn their dollar, earn their laugh, every single time.
00:12:21.000That's how I've tried to approach it, and it really comes, the pressure comes from more of a sense of responsibility in realizing how much this means to other people, which, that's something I wasn't ready for.
00:12:31.000Honestly, when I was just doing stand-up in smoker clubs where drunks were mad at you or doing open mics, you didn't expect someone would come up and say, hey, I didn't kill myself because of your show.
00:12:40.000This is something I know you've touched on.
00:12:41.000I think we've sort of struck a chord in culture right now.
00:13:36.000The Daily Show is behind the paywall over at CRTV.
00:13:39.000It's about a 44-minute clock, like traditional shows, and then on Thursday we do one extra guest.
00:13:44.000Right, but the amount of time that you put into these shows is just extraordinary.
00:13:47.000So what is the organization like for these shows?
00:13:50.000So, well, to give you an idea, I'm up 4.30 or 5, and I'm working by 5.30, writing the jokes, writing the pitches.
00:13:56.000Because if I write 20 jokes, maybe two will work.
00:13:59.000And we have a couple other people now who help with some jokes.
00:14:01.000Owen Benjamin comes in hourly and is really helpful, but really for the first, well, three years we did it on radio, and then The Daily Show was just me.
00:14:10.000He's a brilliant joke writer who writes for the website.
00:14:12.000And then we go and we do the pitch meeting.
00:14:14.000So I'll put in a bunch of material before the actual pitch meeting occurs, which will occur at around 8.30 in the morning.
00:14:19.000They go in, add some of their ideas, or see how they're going to delegate the tasks, because we'll typically have like
00:14:24.000Two sketches, three or four photoshops, as far as original comedy bits, and then some punchlines.
00:14:31.000And then we do a dive-in segment, or meet segment, everyone has a different term for it nowadays, where we're kind of staking out one topic.
00:14:38.000That's the clip people see who aren't Mug Club members.
00:14:40.000And with that, that's where we go, okay, we have a beginning, middle, and end in a self-encapsulated segment that people can digest.
00:14:47.000And whether it's taking on the top five AR-15 myths, you know, of that day, or it's doing a rebuttal to whoever, Vox or Young Turks, we have to be really, really meticulous about our research.
00:14:57.000Because we're actually held to a higher standard, funny enough, as comedians.
00:15:01.000Because I think the Jon Stewart comedian hat on, journalist hat off, you know, actually kind of gave us Leslie way on the right.
00:15:08.000Even though they give it to everyone on the left.
00:15:09.000So Michelle Wolf's show got cancelled.
00:17:01.000Well, what we really do is if we have a guest we really don't like, then after the show, we strap them down, we shine it really bright in their face, and then we just beat them.
00:17:10.000Are those incandescents or are they LEDs to look like incandescents?
00:17:39.000Owen Benjamin has been taken to task for using the N-word in one of his comedy routines.
00:17:43.000Where do you think it's appropriate to draw lines as a comedian?
00:17:45.000Do you think there should be any lines as a comedian?
00:17:48.000Obviously, there are certain things that you won't do, even though you're the guy who paints Muhammad with menstrual blood as Bob Ross on camera.
00:17:54.000Where do you decide where those lines are, and when is it appropriate to cross them?
00:18:25.000Uh, and everyone will have their own line.
00:18:26.000As a society, I'm very uncomfortable with saying, this is, these are the list of appropriate words, these are the list of inappropriate words, like we were just talking about before, uh, on DMX.
00:18:35.000You know, I was listening to his music, the N-word, MF-er, B-word, talking about killing people, and the, do we have to bleep me?
00:20:44.000But one thing that I do think is interesting about Donald Trump, because obviously you weren't a big fan of his, and in a lot of ways still aren't, and I was not at all during the primaries, and in a lot of ways I'm still not.
00:20:53.000I think we're seeing a transition with President Trump that you've seen with a lot of young conservatives who we reach.
00:20:57.000I think he was a guy who gave to Democrats for most of his life.
00:21:33.000But how do we deal with the fact that he's
00:21:36.000You're not toxic in the same way to young people.
00:21:38.000So young people watch your show because they know you're a comedy guy.
00:21:41.000They're willing to give you the benefit of the doubt when you say something that's offensive because, as you say, you know what's offensive, you know what's not.
00:21:47.000And if you're being offensive, it's generally being deliberately offensive for comedic purposes.
00:21:51.000President Trump just sort of says things.
00:22:35.000If you would ask me, I think we would both agree on this.
00:22:37.000Culturally, definitely he's opened the door for conservatives to not be so ashamed of what they are, even though he's not one of them.
00:22:45.000But I don't think Marco Rubio would have done this.
00:22:47.000I don't think even Senator Ted Cruz, I don't think Chris Christie, obviously, would have gone after the media in the same way that Donald Trump has.
00:22:55.000So I think, even though, this thing is squeaking.
00:23:12.000So I think that's what's important about President Donald Trump.
00:23:14.000I think even though people may not like him, I think a lot of young people are happy to see the burdens, the shackles of political correctness kind of be thrown off, and he has helped pave the way for them.
00:23:23.000So you live a very high-stress lifestyle, obviously.
00:23:47.000That's a real thing, and I actually had some good friends who are former UFC champions, and I used to go see a psychologist, and I didn't get a lot out of it.
00:23:55.000And the psychologist I go and see is actually a sports psychologist, an executive psychologist.
00:23:59.000It's really more about time management.
00:24:01.000It's really more about, okay, how are you being disciplined about your rest?
00:24:04.000You know, I was talking with Dennis Prager about this.
00:24:06.000You kind of have to fight against your nature.
00:24:09.000There is, a lot of comedians are lazy.
00:24:13.000I would border on paranoid as far as, we actually just printed out just the jokes that we wrote last, that I wrote last year and not including the research, the auxiliary, it was thousands upon thousands upon thousands of pages just in jokes for the show.
00:24:26.000That's including the ones that made it.
00:24:27.000So it genuinely has helped me a lot seeing the right kind of psychologist who's talked about how to schedule your life and taught me to be more disciplined about rest.
00:26:38.000And a very attractive lady, your wife, you've done very well for yourself.
00:26:42.000And with us, with what we do, because like you said, it's disrespectful, my show is substantially more of a workload to put a daily show, like a late night show.
00:26:50.000Yeah, comedy shows have to be written.
00:26:51.000Yes, and we do the sketches and the production, you know, it's really difficult.
00:26:55.000So it's kind of like, we had Brian Shaw, world's strongest man on the show recently.
00:26:59.000We had Daniel Cormier, current UFC heavyweight, light heavyweight champion.
00:27:03.000And it really is a partnership where their wives have to support them in a way that's not typical.
00:27:08.000And I know some women are going to be furious when they hear this, but it is a volunteer role.
00:27:13.000But my wife has kind of accepted that, okay, Stephen's going to need a little more support because if I don't help him with lunch, he's not going to take 20 minutes to eat.
00:27:22.000And that comes down to, you know, when I'm done working, listening to her, making sure that her needs are met.
00:27:27.000If we're going to bitch about feminism, then we need to talk about being real men.
00:27:31.000And that means, yes, I know it sounds namby-pamby, but meeting your wife's needs, making sure that, and that's just, that's not just physically and financially we're talking about, spiritually, emotionally, making sure that they feel heard, that they feel safe.
00:27:41.000So it really has been a learning process.
00:27:45.000And I will say that contrary to some people who we know, my wife's a very strong,
00:29:20.000There are certain pressures that come with your position, my position, that a lot of people don't... This isn't the celebrity... Insulating yourself from the possibility of sin is a definite must in any position where you are prominent at all.
00:29:30.000You've got to take the proper precautions.
00:29:31.000You've got to determine what is a worthy risk and what isn't.
00:29:36.000What's a worthwhile risk for a guy who painted Muhammad in menstrual blood?
00:29:40.000But no, I wouldn't have been able to accomplish what we have, you know, what moderate success we have and I'm grateful for without my wife.
00:29:49.000Okay, so I want to talk to you a little bit about sort of your mental state and then we'll get into some politics and social media and all the rest of this stuff.
00:29:58.000Whether you're in a cafe or a hotel, we often rely on public Wi-Fi to use the internet on the go.
00:30:02.000But something as simple as paying your bills online from a Starbucks could leave your data exposed.
00:30:06.000A hacker could easily intercept your information, stealing passwords, credit card numbers, or the pornography that Steven was browsing just before the show.
00:31:19.000In any case, let's talk about the fact that you're a crazy person.
00:31:22.000So, as everyone can see, you're a wild man.
00:31:24.000And this is not a rip on you, this is just the nature, partly, of being in comedy.
00:31:28.000That most people who are in comedy, I've never met anybody who is a full-time comedian who doesn't have edges, right?
00:31:34.000Who doesn't have to be a wild man, has to be on all the time.
00:31:36.000So what do you think is the relationship between comedy and mental health, between comedy and being a wild person and having a normal life and still having to be on all the time trying to make people laugh?
00:31:45.000Gosh, I don't want this to become a Barbara Walters where it becomes this introspective self-importance.
00:32:33.000And I didn't shave until I was like 20, 21.
00:32:36.000I just had peach fuzz and I didn't get chest hair until I was 24.
00:32:38.000The Crowders are very late bloomers and the potential for being an angry late bloomer is scary because I'm a relative, there's a lot of velocity now.
00:32:49.000You were just like, there's nothing there.
00:32:50.000And then all of a sudden... All of a sudden, yeah, it happened very, very late.
00:32:54.000Think about when people, this is one thing that really bothers when we talk about mental health.
00:32:57.000And I've tried to be forthcoming with a lot of people out there because it seems the only time people talk about it is when it's virtue signaling, you know, and Heath Ledger passes away.
00:33:03.000And it's like, everyone's like, ah, I mean, I've struggled with this.
00:33:06.000But where were you when this didn't happen?
00:33:37.000I just remember there were times in my life in high school where I just thought like, man, I just, I just wish I didn't have to wake up tomorrow in the sense that I just, I hated my life so much.
00:33:47.000It'd be like me saying, you have to coach swimming starting tomorrow morning for the rest of your life.
00:33:51.000You know, because at that point in your life, high school is everything.
00:33:53.000You know, grade school and high school, that's all you know.
00:33:54.000As you know, I'm not big on men and speedos, so.
00:36:05.000So I think it's important to talk about with people because I think there are a lot of kids out there who think there's something wrong with them and there's really not.
00:36:12.000There's a lot wrong with our public education system today.
00:36:15.000There's a lot wrong with the way we raise young men.
00:36:18.000There's a lot wrong with the way we discuss mental health of the society.
00:36:22.000But a lot of the time there's nothing wrong with these people.
00:36:25.000I totally agree with a lot of that, and mental illness runs in my family as well, so I totally get where you're coming from.
00:36:32.000We actually didn't get the full chronology of how you got from a socialist province in Canada where you wanted to kill yourself in a classroom to you living in Texas and making comedy.
00:37:45.000And I remember being at an open mic— The first time I met Stephen Harper, I asked him if he—Barack Obama was president—I asked him if it was possible he would invade.
00:38:02.000If you're rolling the dice on that, if you're going to look at the statistical likelihood, you know, it's just a guy in a diesel plane with a shotgun.
00:38:31.000His joke was, in French, something might be lost in translation, like a kid who had a make-a-wish in Canada, was their equivalent, and his make-a-wish was to be on Canadian Idol.
00:38:40.000So here's the thing, I guess it turned out the kid wasn't as terminally ill as we thought, because he's still alive.
00:39:11.000Sorry, we're getting into the minutiae of Canada nobody cares about.
00:39:14.000The judges still wear funny wigs sometimes.
00:39:16.000But the point is, I remember they couldn't realize it all.
00:39:20.000Back then, they wouldn't even be able to comprehend a Jordan Peterson, this compulsion of language.
00:39:25.000And I remember at that open mic night going, wow, these people have no idea what's coming.
00:39:30.000They have no idea that even if they're pro-abortion, even if they want to smoke weed, the flip side of the coin of Stephen Harper, who also, by the way, helped prevent the housing crisis in Canada.
00:39:41.000Who actually helped the middle class do pretty well, whereas here they ended up footing the bill under Barack Obama for years.
00:39:47.000Canada actually, for the first time, I think, was higher on the economic freedom index.
00:39:50.000But the freedom of speech, it's not a constitutionally enshrined right.
00:39:54.000And for me, doing stand-up early on, I just, I wasn't really super political.
00:41:51.000It's like that scene from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, where they start off at one end of the room, and by the time you get to the other end of the room, everybody's sort of crouching down.
00:41:58.000And then Trump's a big dude, so I imagine he actually has to Crisco himself up and just wedge himself through the doorways to get around there.
00:42:03.000At that point, the Crisco is incidental.
00:42:04.000It's not to wedge himself through the doorway.
00:42:14.000So I was just doing stand-up, and funny enough, that you bring this up, my first manager was a guy named Tony Camacho, who was black, in New York.
00:42:21.000And the reason he brought me on as a client was because I ended my whole stand-up set on the N-word.
00:42:46.000And he would not be a conservative at all.
00:42:49.000He was a Christian guy, family values guy, he was a conservative who didn't realize it.
00:42:53.000So he brought me to the States and I just started doing stand-up, some really crappy clubs, but got some pilots with MTV and then got some films and commercials and that took me full circle.
00:43:01.000So I was in LA and back in New York and LA and New York again.
00:43:04.000Yeah, it was always just stand-up and acting.
00:43:06.000And then how'd you get on, like, Fox News?
00:43:08.000I mean, how do you go from stand-up and acting to being on Fox News?
00:43:10.000Well, you know that story, because you negotiate— I do, but my audience doesn't.
00:43:35.000So we did a YouTube video where it was called BEST IMPRESSIONS EVER, all caps.
00:43:39.000And it was me doing really bad impressions.
00:43:41.000My brother was my Ed McMahon laughing.
00:43:43.000And the reason it went viral was because in the comment section you had people who were like, these are the worst impressions ever, you suck, you know, go kill yourself.
00:43:50.000Then you had people saying, this is satire, you don't get it, go kill yourselves.
00:43:53.000Then you had some people saying, no, actually, these are really good impressions, you guys are wrong.
00:43:57.000And then you had some people who just thought, got the joke, but didn't think it was funny.
00:44:02.000And we learned, wow, this is how you make something go viral, is you get something that strikes a chord.
00:44:05.000But I didn't do anything politically until, I would say, 2008, 2009.
00:44:09.000And at that point, I had just finished filming.
00:44:13.000Doing a Christian film in San Diego and I had done some episodes actually on an ABC Family show where that was an experience where I was actually talking with a guy on set about South Park and he was talking about how much he liked it and he said some things that made me think he was conservative like in on the gag but then I just realized he didn't get the satire and he told on me to the director.
00:44:32.000Where I was like, yeah, I know, I love the way they lampoon the left, liberals.
00:44:34.000And he was like, what are you talking about, bro?
00:45:07.000Six months, treat YouTube like a full-time job.
00:45:09.000I'm going to upload a video every week, just put up a blue bed sheet on the wall, and I actually messaged people every single day for six hours a day saying, hey, you might want to check out my channel and responding.
00:45:18.000And that's how I got the first 10,000 subscribers, the first semi-viral video was Crazy Pete's Abortion Barn.
00:45:23.000I actually read from the Planned Parenthood website because they sounded like a used car salesman.
00:45:27.000And that was when I learned early on, if I just actually read Planned Parenthood's transcript effectively, it doesn't matter how offensive I am as a used car salesman selling abortions at half price.
00:45:36.000And then the Quran challenge, and things sort of became viral, and then I had heard Andrew Breitbart on the Dennis Miller show, and just called him.
00:45:43.000And you know, Andrew spoke with me for like 30 minutes, so he put up some of my old stand-up, and people liked it, so I started writing articles.
00:45:48.000PJTV came along, and I started working with them, and then Fox News, when I was working here at PJTV in Los Angeles, they said, hey, do you want to come appear on our network?
00:45:58.000And I said, sure, and I didn't know, by the way, we can talk about it now, but I didn't know about the rivalry between O'Reilly and Hannity.
00:46:04.000So Hannity called, and I said yes, and then the O'Reilly people called right afterward, and I said yes, and then they called back and said, well, hold on a second, we didn't know you were doing Hannity, you have to pick one, we're the bigger show.
00:46:13.000I said, well, I gave them my word, and then I was persona non grata.
00:46:22.000So what happened was I think they brought me in to lose because I was on a debate when they first brought me in and I think it surprised a lot of people that I did relatively well.
00:46:30.000I think they weren't used to someone who was a little bit quicker as a comedian.
00:46:33.000It's kind of just like fighting someone who's unorthodox.
00:46:35.000And then they brought me back and brought me back.
00:46:38.000And then when I started appearing on other news networks,
00:46:41.000They didn't really know what they wanted to do with me.
00:46:43.000They just knew they didn't want anyone else to have me.
00:46:45.000So that's what they were paying for back then was exclusivity.
00:46:47.000And it was four and a half years of my life.
00:46:49.000I'm very grateful for the experience, but I'm very grateful now to be doing what I want to be doing and to not have the muzzle on.
00:46:55.000Well, I'm definitely going to ask you about sort of where your political perspective was formed and also
00:47:00.000You know, the areas of your career where you've gone serious, mainly the change my mind stuff.
00:47:04.000So I'm going to ask you about all that in just one second.
00:47:05.000First, let's talk about jeans, because this dude right here doesn't have any pants.
00:47:08.000But he could use some pants, because come the hell on, it's just terrible in every possible way.
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00:47:30.000I mean, these are luxury jeans for $100.
00:47:32.000You can only get them at Mott & Bow.com.
00:49:35.000And I found that almost everyone I really liked or enjoyed
00:49:38.000Later on in life, I found I was a conservative, like John Stossel.
00:49:41.000I used to wait for his Give Me a Break segments after TGIF in 2020, where he would just take a steaming one, he'd just drop it all over something, like New York liberals, and I didn't even know what a liberal or a conservative was as a kid, but he'd, give me a break.
00:49:56.000He'd talk to this head of Navajo Nation, the white man forced me to live this way, and he said, but you're wearing jeans.
00:50:02.000And as a kid, I was like, I wanna be this guy, if I can merge him and David Letterman.
00:50:07.000Inherently, I was always kind of an individualist.
00:50:12.000And I had, just like Woody Allen, I had a general problem with authority.
00:50:16.000So I think that just sort of culminated in what you see before you, what you ogle before you.
00:50:22.000How did you decide to, your show is really split in an interesting way.
00:50:25.000So mine is based on serious material, and then I'll stray every so often and make a joke or do a weird impression that's usually pretty bad.
00:50:32.000But for you, because- I appreciate that.
00:50:35.000First part of getting help is admitting you have a problem.
00:50:37.000Well, they're not all that bad, Steve.
00:51:53.000You know, and that was one thing I hate, you know, a lot of people, I don't want to be put in a box, because the truth is, people come to the show to laugh, to be entertained, but people also really enjoy... I mean, our rule on our show, as I tell people, if we are creating content, or if I create content that does not meet this criteria,
00:52:09.000It either has to be, well, first off, it always has to be entertaining, and it either has to be informative or enlightening.
00:52:14.000And informative means, you know, we're breaking news, like the people who wanted to stab supporters at the University of Utah.
00:52:20.000Remember that call when I told them, like, hey, listen, they handed out a knife to us and they're handing out, you were like, they're handing out ice picks?
00:53:51.000And I remember always saying, man, I just wish that we could sort of capture these conversations that we have with people, you know, whether I'm getting my hair cut or I'm in an Uber.
00:54:00.000I'll have these conversations with people.
00:54:01.000And it be completely unedited so that people could see it's not that hard to do.
00:54:46.000So, you know, I think both you and I have been in a space where we've both been very irritated by the sort of stodginess of conservative media, by the fact that so much of conservative media seems stuck in a rut, unwilling to kind of move out of that rut.
00:55:37.000Those are the only two medium in which people tend to work.
00:55:42.000You've got the Milo Yiannopoulos, I'm just gonna say stuff to say stuff and piss people off.
00:55:46.000And then you've got the Paul Ryan, let me wonk you to death.
00:55:50.000How does conservatism find a middle ground that actually appeals to a broader swath of people?
00:55:53.000Well, first off, I know that you really hate the, sort of, the provocateurship, if that's the word, just for the sake of it, and I appreciate that you've delineated between what we do and people who just go out there and say something, you know, racist.
00:56:03.000I appreciate that, because I know, listen, we could get in hot water, and I know that you know our heart and where we come from, and our goal is never to actually just...
00:56:10.000We see people all the time say, won't somebody do something?
00:56:27.000I mean, how many rooms did we sit in with these underground organizations?
00:56:31.000I think the cat's out of the bag with that one.
00:56:33.000We were like, where's the conservative late night?
00:56:35.000You know, where's the answer to the daily show?
00:56:37.000And I was at Fox pitching the show that I'm doing for day in and day out for four and a half years and I'm just saying, no, it's not going to work.
00:56:41.000They paired me up with a guy who was like, he was like 90 years old with four-year-old kids.
00:57:49.000And some of these people were crying because they had left Islam, and now they couldn't talk with their parents, or giving me their Navy Cross.
00:57:56.000So just be the person who does something.
00:57:59.000We're doing the show that we wanted to do.
00:58:01.000And I know that you, for a long time, listen, you did a lot of AM radio, and you appeared on a lot of- We both slogged in a lot of trenches.
00:58:07.000But you finally just, I know that you were going, why doesn't somebody do something?
00:59:14.000But you didn't look a day past 14, so that's what really counts.
00:59:17.000But I would love to be the person who said to a young Steven Crowder, this will never work.
00:59:23.000Change my mind is not a book that people want.
00:59:25.000Late night comedy is not something that conservatives want.
00:59:27.000I would love to be the guy that goes, okay kid, you're talented, let's see how hard you work at it, and let me be a wind in your sails here.
00:59:37.000I'd love to be able to do that eventually.
00:59:39.000It's really not about myself, because if it dies with me, then it's all for nothing.
00:59:44.000Unfortunately, there aren't many conservative, I don't even say comedians, but entertainers out there.
00:59:49.000Because the system, kind of like you said, it breeds sort of young,
00:59:53.000CNN Crossfire era Tucker Carlson lookalikes, when you go to a lot of these conventions.
01:00:25.000So I've seen how, even in the time we've known each other, your comedy has really progressed to the point where, I mean, you were always good, but now you're just terrific in a way that you weren't a long time ago.
01:00:34.000And that is through cultivation of skill and effort.
01:00:36.000And I feel the same way about my own career.
01:00:38.000You know, I've been doing this since I was 17, which means I've been doing this for 17 years now.
01:00:41.000And I feel like I've gotten better at it because you put in the time and you get better.
01:00:47.000Like at a certain point, you really have to cultivate a skill.
01:00:50.000It feels like the movement spends an awful lot of time promoting people who have not actually spent the time cultivating the skill, if you either mouth the platitudes, or alternatively, if you troll.
01:01:01.000And these are the two paths to fame and glory in the conservative movement, which is you say a bumper sticker, or you say something really troll-y just to get attention, and then you are celebrated by the people who are glad that somebody said something offensive.
01:01:12.000That's not, I think, where the future of the movement lies.
01:01:14.000That's where I'm inspired to see you do so well.
01:01:17.000Because there was a period, like you and I both know, there was a period not that long ago where we thought our careers were in doubt because it was just the whole kind of troll-y or bumper sticker slogan.
01:01:25.000We both, I remember talking on the phone.
01:01:28.000We were like, man, I don't know if this is the end of this where it's a bumper sticker or just saying something outlandish, but that's not what we do and we're not going to change who we are.
01:01:35.000I always sort of vicariously live through your success.
01:01:38.000I'm glad to see that someone can do what Ben does because he's doing what he wanted to do for a long time.
01:02:14.000Anyway, but the point is he goes to this town.
01:02:16.000He's this famous shootist, you know, he's a shootout artist, and he wants to die.
01:02:20.000So he wants to live quietly, but unfortunately a young Ron Howard lets the word out that this guy is in town and everyone wants to take their crack at him.
01:02:28.000And at this point John Wayne has a death wish.
01:02:51.000Because he knows he could let this happen and he wants to die but instead he turns around and shoots the guy and finishes his drink and it's kind of melancholic.
01:02:59.000And it's because he wanted to be taken out but he wasn't going to give it to him.
01:03:03.000And that's kind of how I want there to be someone else eventually but it's got to be someone who
01:03:10.000Same thing, I'm sure, with you as you get older and when you retire.
01:03:12.000It's got to be someone who you can entrust with what we've built.
01:03:14.000And I think also it's a big space, and I hope that there are a lot of voices in it.
01:03:17.000So I hope that you're wrong and that you're continuing to do this after, you know, after the age of 41, because come on.
01:03:22.000I just don't want to have to, but go back to your sponsors.
01:03:24.000Okay, so I do have one more question for you.
01:03:26.000I want to hear your greatest fear for the country and your greatest hope for the country, but for our listeners, if you actually want to hear Stephen's answer, you have to be a Daily Wire subscriber.
01:03:34.000To subscribe, go to dailywire.com, click subscribe, and you can hear the end of our conversation.
01:03:53.000The Ben Shapiro Show Sunday Special is produced by Jonathan Hay, Executive Producer Jeremy Boring, Associate Producers Mathis Glover and Austin Stevens, edited by Alex Zingaro, audio is mixed by Mike Karamina, hair and makeup is by Jeswa Alvera, and title graphics by Cynthia Angulo.
01:04:07.000The Ben Shapiro Show Sunday Special is a Daily Wire Forward Publishing production.