The Michael Knowles Show - Anti-WOKE Comedy and Going Viral ｜ Ryan Long

00:00:00.000 Hey everybody, Michael Knowles here. All this talk of anti-racism, the Woka-Cola

00:00:06.360 campaign to make us all be less white, all this kind of insane racial grievance has me thinking

00:00:16.080 out to one of my favorite videos from the entire summer. This was put out by my friend Ryan Long,

00:00:23.080 a comedian who, I'm not saying the guy's conservative, he just does not toe the left

00:00:27.700 wing party line. I chatted with Ryan about racism and anti-racism over the summer. I think

00:00:33.800 what he had to say is truer now than it ever has been. Take a listen.

00:00:40.280 There's a strange phenomenon going around in politics today, which is that if you look at the

00:00:45.880 extreme left, like the woke left, and you look at, you know, the four like white supremacists left in

00:00:53.800 America, you know, I guess what you would call the extreme right, even though some people quibble

00:00:57.660 about that. When you listen to them talk, they sound eerily similar. You may even have seen this

00:01:04.820 video going around the internet recently from the comedian Ryan Long.

00:01:08.300 It's like he's a mind reader. I mean, I've been pushing for segregation forever and my man does

00:01:12.920 what? I created an improv comedy show exclusively for ethnic people. Guy segregates comedy on my

00:01:17.900 birthday. White people need to stop wearing dreadlocks and they need to stop appropriating 1.00

00:01:21.560 black people's music. Shaved heads and country music the way God intended. You know, all white 1.00

00:01:25.720 people are racist. I'm listening. So it goes on. You should go check out the entire video. Well,

00:01:32.940 we've got that man who put out that video and lots of other really funny content. Ryan Long,

00:01:38.080 a comedian and filmmaker from America's hat, Toronto, Canada, but he now lives in New York

00:01:43.920 City amid all the crazy lockdowns. You may have seen him on Netflix, NBC, MTV, Fuse TV, The Score,

00:01:51.560 but nobody watches any of those like legacy channels anymore. Probably you've seen him on his YouTube

00:01:55.960 channel or you've listened to his podcast, The Boys Cast with Ryan Long. Ryan, thank you for being here.

00:02:01.780 Hey, buddy. Thanks for having me, dude. I love your stuff. I think it's extremely funny.

00:02:07.240 And the, the thing that shocks me most about it is I don't understand with the way that you have

00:02:13.120 poked fun, well, you know, also at the right, but especially at the left, how you've not been

00:02:17.920 canceled yet. Why are you still around? Why are you not canceled? Dude, there's a, there was like a

00:02:23.180 bunch of people on the internet. Every time I open my phone right now, it's a bunch of people yelling

00:02:26.100 at each other and yelling at me. This is the virtual rage, the virtual rage room of Twitter.

00:02:31.040 So people know, definitely people have gotten canceled, but are tried to cancel me. But one

00:02:35.580 of the funny things is people like me that aren't in the industry anymore, and I'm kind of doing my

00:02:40.160 own thing. And they, so now they're kind of like canceling each other because they go, oh, we're

00:02:45.420 going to take your job away. And you go, what jobs are you taking away? My RRS, my RSS feed. So I'm not

00:02:51.480 in that game anymore. So a lot of people like me are doing our own thing because the industry

00:02:55.440 stinks right now.

00:02:56.760 Well, it's funny you mentioned that because, you know, I was, I was only half joking when I said,

00:03:00.500 I don't care about NBC, MTV, like none of that really interests me.

00:03:04.480 You're right though.

00:03:04.960 It's like your content, your YouTube channel is way more interesting to me. And the same goes for a lot

00:03:10.780 of other comedian friends. That's much more interesting than getting some network TV co-star

00:03:15.700 or something like that.

00:03:17.380 Dude, those networks right now are basically going to everyone in America and they're saying,

00:03:21.020 this is what you like now. And everyone's like, no, it's not. What are you talking about?

00:03:25.020 Like if I take the crazy pills and they're like, here's your new favorite comedian. And everyone's

00:03:28.360 like, what? This guy is, you know, they, they used to do this in old Hollywood. You'd say it'd be

00:03:33.440 like, your next movie star is going to be Johnny Smith. You know, and they'd go to some small town

00:03:39.020 and find some random guy and foist him on you. And that, that doesn't seem to work anymore.

00:03:44.200 No, they, the, probably the most recent one of those was John Krasinski. After the office,

00:03:48.200 there was like 95 movies where they're like, huh, John from Jim from the office. And everyone's

00:03:52.000 like, I mean, I guess he's okay. I guess if I have to, I guess I'll watch it. You know,

00:03:57.900 on the, on the point of being canceled for politics, your videos have gone viral, especially

00:04:03.860 because you've dinged the left, but you've also dinged the right too. You know, it's not

00:04:09.000 like you're, you're kind of cutting both ways here.

00:04:11.140 Yeah. Yeah. I think I'm like, a lot of times I'm just digging like dogmatic thinking and I'm not

00:04:16.080 even necessarily saying anything about the ideology as much as like the people who make

00:04:20.360 it their entire identity and try to push it on everyone else.

00:04:22.540 Yeah. I mean, would, would you, would you consider yourself a conservative or you're kind of just,

00:04:27.120 you're a comedian. You're kind of outside of politics or partisan politics generally.

00:04:32.200 Yeah. That's what I'd like to think of it. I kind of like to think of it. If there was two

00:04:35.440 people fighting over who's going to be the teacher and I'm the kid at the back of the class,

00:04:38.480 sort of making fun of it, but people, so when you say that, people always go, so you're a

00:04:41.740 centrist. I go, no, I'm not playing the game. I'm not part of the game. And that used to be okay,

00:04:47.060 to be completely honest. It didn't, you know, and that's obviously something that's, you know,

00:04:51.480 way worse on the woke left where they want your, they want your political identity to be like your

00:04:56.420 entire part of your personality. It used to be like, you know, all this guy, he's into football and

00:05:00.460 he did this. Now it's like, oh, so-and-so he's a liberal or he's a conservative. And you know,

00:05:04.820 everyone has their leanings, but that didn't used to have to be like the entire thing that

00:05:08.200 defines you and who you hang out with and who you date and what shows you watch. So that's

00:05:12.740 one of the parts that's extra crazy right now. That used to be the idea of the artist actually

00:05:17.780 going back to a medieval comedy, going back to like Dante who wrote the divine comedy.

00:05:22.520 He has this, he has this famous, there's this famous line in the, in the poem where he says,

00:05:26.460 I left partisan politics, you know, I'm going to, I'm going to be a party of one. And he used to

00:05:31.640 think of comedians as like, yeah, he's a party of one. You know, he's going to dig into these guys.

00:05:36.000 He's going to dig into these guys. He's going to show these absurdities. But I noticed the

00:05:40.660 criticism of you is not coming from the right. It's, it's only coming from one side of the

00:05:45.900 political aisle right now. Yeah. I even said that 99% of the people that were mad at my video work

00:05:51.300 in entertainment or the media, normal people don't care. Well, it's kind of like the, the,

00:05:57.540 the woke left, you know, they kind of run Hollywood and they're the predominant power right now.

00:06:01.600 Right. It's kind of like, if you think of them as, so they're, they're always kicking people out,

00:06:06.100 right? They're, you're not allowed in our club and the right. And far as media goes,

00:06:10.360 they're always like, Hey, can you come over here? Come on. The water's warm. Come on in here.

00:06:15.000 Right. And they kind of say, Hey, the, so it's the rights, everyone's trying to push you to the

00:06:18.900 right, regardless of what your ideology is. But one of the reasons that you want to stay,

00:06:23.540 I personally want to stay away from even like planting a flag down is cause I mean,

00:06:27.900 you've probably been alive long enough to see those two words change so much in such a short

00:06:32.800 period of time. So when you start saying I'm a this, and then six months later, they can tell

00:06:37.360 you, Oh, remember that thing you are, it means something completely different now. And you think

00:06:40.760 this now, and you think this now, and you go, you know what, I'm just not going to take a label if

00:06:44.140 you're going to change them every 15 minutes. And I have to like update what I think.

00:06:47.060 Of course, it's so much easier, you know, rather than having to keep up with whatever the latest

00:06:51.140 thing is changing out. It seems like it changes hourly. Instead, you can just think what you think.

00:06:55.420 Yeah. Who do we hate? Who are we going to, who are we going to tar and feather out of here?

00:06:59.400 Well, you know, on that, on that point of like the industry, tar and feathering people. I remember 0.56

00:07:04.280 when Adam Carolla started his podcast, he called it the pirate ship. And he said, I'm not going to

00:07:09.040 be beholden to Hollywood. I'm going to be in a pirate ship. And he said, okay, that's nice. You're

00:07:12.680 in your own little area, but all the big money, all the big shows that that's all in mainstream

00:07:17.080 Hollywood. Now I look at all the biggest shows. I look guys like Joe Rogan, for instance,

00:07:21.320 right? Joe Rogan is a zillion times bigger than virtually anybody who works in mainstream

00:07:26.320 Hollywood. Do you see, do you see Hollywood getting its kind of mainstream power back?

00:07:32.380 Or is this, is this isolated, you know, go your own way, do your own channel. Is that the future

00:07:38.440 of entertainment? Yeah. And it's not just, I mean, they lost control of the press tour. Like you were

00:07:42.900 saying, like it used to be, you have a movie and you go, okay, we'll put you on this show,

00:07:45.400 this show, this show. Now it's like, if you want to do that, you call Joe Rogan. And if he feels like

00:07:49.340 it, you don't have control of him. So yeah, you're right. I mean, it's so crazy to watch that

00:07:53.880 happen, but it's not just Hollywood. I mean, it's the, it's a, the universities it's, you know,

00:07:59.300 this virus has gone everywhere. Right. So the amount of people that just work at some company

00:08:04.140 and they're getting their stuff shoved down their throat every second. So it's so pervasive. It's

00:08:08.880 hard to, and there's this loop of, you know, advertisers needing to be woke, them making woke

00:08:13.620 content. Cause if you say, oh, we're going to do this edgy show, your advertisers are like, well,

00:08:18.060 we want the no Trump show, you know? So it's the, someone would have to like clear out the

00:08:23.360 whole regime of, you know, 20, you know, 20 year old girl opinions. If they, if they wanted to 0.99

00:08:28.200 actually say, we're going to make South park again or something like that. Right. So I think

00:08:32.460 it's a complicated scenario, but it sounds like this is going to happen and they're going to probably

00:08:37.540 like they do with everything else. Like they're doing with podcasting, they get into the game late

00:08:40.960 and they're going to just have to drop boatloads of cash at people's houses. If they want to get 0.82

00:08:44.940 back in the game five years late, you know? Well, speaking of 20 something year old girl 0.98

00:08:49.060 opinions, it was actually the way I first found you is my wife who, you know, is a little more 0.98

00:08:54.220 reasonable than most 20 something year old girls. But my wife, my wife said, you got to watch this

00:08:58.220 guy. This guy's really funny. And my first reaction was, okay, it's going to be one of these,

00:09:02.640 like how many times do you hear, oh, you got to watch this funny video on the internet. And,

00:09:05.820 but the guy isn't, he's not a comedian. He's like just a guy who did a funny thing on the internet

00:09:10.080 one time. You think, okay, whatever. But the thing that strikes me about you is you're not

00:09:14.900 just a guy who did a funny thing on the internet. You are an actual comedian and there is a huge

00:09:19.580 difference here, you know, between just some kind of hobbyist and an actual pro from your vantage

00:09:25.640 within the comedy world, the pro real comedy world. What is the consensus here now? I mean,

00:09:33.340 what, what is funny? What is, what are people who actually make people laugh for a living?

00:09:38.840 What are they going toward? Well, that's why like doing comedy clubs for the last 10 years,

00:09:44.900 three times a night, you know, actually finding out what real people think instead of what these

00:09:49.640 people do, where they design what they think they should think and then work backwards.

00:09:53.700 They're like, well, we know what we want them to think. Let's move backwards from there. We'll

00:09:58.120 design everything backwards from the ideology of like where we'd like it to end up. Whereas,

00:10:03.260 you know, I've always been like sort of a counterculture guy and a punk guy. Like I know

00:10:06.360 if I went out there and I was, I said, Trump's a loser. And I could see people like kind of being

00:10:11.220 like, all right. Yeah. Like I hear that I could, I could turn on my TV and have people yell at me

00:10:15.620 all day. You know, if I want, if I want to listen to, if I want to get yelled at by a comedian,

00:10:19.560 I can listen to Stephen Colbert. So, I mean, for me, it's, I've, I've always kind of been into

00:10:24.800 actual counterculture and kind of speaking against what the mainstream ideology is and what the

00:10:30.340 viewpoints that I feel like are shoved down my throat and what we're forced to lie about.

00:10:34.320 Yeah. But it doesn't mean everyone has to do that. I mean, depends on your sensibilities,

00:10:37.420 right? Like a lot of comedians just want to go up there and make jokes about Uber. But the problem

00:10:41.500 is those comedians that used to be, Hey, I'm going to make jokes about coffee and Uber. The world's

00:10:46.760 like, also you have to be into politics now. And they're like, uh, I don't know. I guess Trump's

00:10:50.760 bad because they're not equipped for that fight. Right. Right. I think even, I think it was like

00:10:54.740 Seinfeld said, they said, why don't you make Trump jokes? And he said, I want to make jokes about

00:10:58.720 strawberry pie. Like I don't, that is not what I, what I want to do. I like this idea of the,

00:11:04.280 the John Krasinski effect that, that, you know, Hollywood, that these, these opinion makers are

00:11:09.340 saying, look, this is what you have to like. This is what's going to be really funny. And you're going

00:11:13.560 to go to the movies and watch it. It's, it's what they did to us in 2016. Right. They said, yeah,

00:11:18.580 that, you know, what people really want is Hillary Clinton. You're like, are you, uh, have you,

00:11:23.420 are you listening to yourself right now? Or frankly, even in 2020, they say,

00:11:26.460 you know what the youths want with the kids that they want? Joe Biden. The people are crying out.

00:11:31.680 And you just think like, you are so disconnected from reality that a, a reality TV star media mogul,

00:11:39.880 who's probably never read two books about politics is much more in line with what the average common,

00:11:47.860 common American is thinking than any of the people you're putting up.

00:11:52.060 Oh, 100%. And then on top of that, they use like dirty tricks,

00:11:56.140 like racial guilt and stuff to try to, you know, force you into those things. Like they,

00:11:59.860 you know, that's some of the stuff I talk about in the, in the thing they go,

00:12:02.020 if you're not black, if you're black and you don't vote this way, you lose your black card.

00:12:05.520 You see them saying that as like, what kind of cult stuff? What are you, everyone's like,

00:12:08.460 what are you talking about? Yeah. You know? Oh, so I'm black. This is the list of opinions I got

00:12:13.540 to have, or I'm a trait. Like, what are you talking about? So I think there's a lot of that stuff

00:12:17.600 going on and they're in a big way missing it. But so people say there's not good comedy.

00:12:22.960 There's lots of really good comedy. I have a lot of friends that are making a lot of good stuff.

00:12:26.300 The industry just needs to catch up in a big way. Well, I also noticed this thing, which is,

00:12:31.060 yeah, now they're saying if you don't vote a certain way, if you don't, you know, you're,

00:12:34.600 you're a traitor to your race, you're a Nazi, you can be a black white supremacist. Now you can be a 0.99

00:12:39.520 Jewish neo-Nazi now. And they, I guess they don't even hear what they're saying, but there's this weird

00:12:45.640 effect that's going on, which is the more and more that people move away from doing what they tell

00:12:53.520 them to do, the, the louder and shriller and more desperate these opinion makers seem to get,

00:13:00.780 you know, is that, is that a sign of, of them losing their grip of power or is it a sign that

00:13:05.700 they're about to clamp down? No, it's the, it's definitely a sign that they've already, I mean,

00:13:10.400 they've already lost their grip of power, but they still own the institutions. I mean, they've

00:13:14.440 lost the control of people's minds a long time, you know, years ago, this COVID stuff, it started

00:13:19.160 to flip, you know, back up again, but it basically feels like you're a company. And instead of being

00:13:25.700 like, Hey, uh, our red shirts are selling by the millions. Let's, uh, let's sell more of those.

00:13:31.240 And they go up production on red. And you're like, why? It's like, we just think that red's better for

00:13:34.960 the people. So they're just, and you go, what? They don't want that. What are you talking about?

00:13:39.780 I was reading, uh, and another reason, like a lot of my friends are so sick of this stuff,

00:13:43.560 whatever color they are, but you know, most of my friends is like, we're just comedians. No one,

00:13:47.080 but you know, that's how we consider ourselves. Right. But they go, there was this big article

00:13:51.460 that was kind of going viral and it was like, why black guys need to talk about their male 1.00

00:13:55.040 privilege or whatever. Right. And it was just all the same stuff. It was like, did you like white 0.82

00:13:59.800 privilege? Well, here's black from the guys that brought you from the creators of male privilege. 0.98

00:14:05.520 Now here's black male privilege, all of the guilt of male privilege, but repurposed for black men. 0.88

00:14:11.140 And you're like, and you, and you think a black guy wants to read this and be like, I'm in. Yeah. 0.98

00:14:15.200 Love it. Yeah. No one likes this stuff. Shut up. Yeah. There's like an infomercial.

00:14:20.220 It's like, but, but wait, there's more. Not only do you get your white privilege,

00:14:23.660 but you also get your black privilege. You know, I was, I was watching this hearing talk about comedy gold.

00:14:28.600 I was watching this hearing the other day of all of these democratic politicians, including Eric

00:14:34.080 Swalwell, my absolute favorite grilling the attorney general, Bill Barr. And so all of these

00:14:39.780 Democrats are grilling Barr and they say, well, Hey, do you think that if we just have completely

00:14:45.860 widespread mail-in ballots with no structures in place to collect them and no accountability,

00:14:51.420 do you think there could be interference in the election? And Barr says, yeah, I think probably

00:14:56.460 there could. And the lady goes, well, do you have any evidence? Do you have any scientific studies?

00:15:01.760 Do you have any proof of that? He goes, no, I have common sense. I guess this is in short supply now,

00:15:07.720 but I guess common sense to me is kind of the prerequisite for comedy. And it would seem to me

00:15:15.740 kind of why the comedy is moving a little bit more to the right. Yeah. I mean, it's, it's,

00:15:21.480 it's definitely, there's a situation where your average person finds themselves leaning towards

00:15:26.840 the right because they just, they go, cause this left basically says you need to be on either side.

00:15:31.800 Yeah. And then normal people go, all right, well, I know I'm not that, you know, especially most

00:15:38.580 people, especially, you know, I'm from Canada and Toronto. Right. So it's like, you know, you kind

00:15:43.080 of grow up in a liberal metropolitan. You sort of, you know, for the most part, only hear one side.

00:15:47.420 Right. And that just became the sort of, so you kind of, you never really paid that much attention

00:15:52.140 to what, you know, maybe you kind of, you get into libertarian, some people kind of become

00:15:55.240 libertarians or whatever. Right. But you know, all you were told was like, that's the bad thing.

00:15:59.240 And they go, well, you got to have a side and you're, I just don't want to be part of this.

00:16:02.340 And they go, well, you have to. And then you start being like, I guess the other side then I don't

00:16:06.780 know, but that's why it's funny for, for comedy, especially because they go, your art's supposed to

00:16:11.960 have a message, right? Which they mean, you know, and you're like, yeah, the Christian church also

00:16:15.580 thinks that my art should be propaganda for a movement. But what they really mean is your

00:16:20.260 art should say my message. And I'm like, cause if they go, art's got to have a message and you go,

00:16:24.680 okay, my art's the Trump's awesome. And you're like, okay, well, it can't be that.

00:16:28.000 Yeah. Whatever it is. You know, I was talking to Adam Carolla the other day and Adam and I disagree

00:16:34.040 on many pretty foundational political issues. Like we actually, you wouldn't, if you were to

00:16:39.660 construct a political party, you wouldn't look at all the people and say like, yeah, those two guys

00:16:43.800 are going to be on the same side. And so Adam has been asked, are you a conservative? And he's like,

00:16:48.620 he's like, here's what happened. One time I said that, that parents should feed their children lunch.

00:16:54.720 I was asked about like a school lunch issue. And I said, yeah, parents should make a ham sandwich for

00:17:00.380 their kids. And then the left got so angry at me that I guess that makes me a conservative. So that's

00:17:06.180 what I am. I'm a, I'm a feed your kids conservative. Who knows? But I guess that's kind of the box that

00:17:11.260 people are being pushed into now. Yeah. I think I'll, you know, and it comes down to the,

00:17:16.560 the, I, the truth is, you know, the, the way America's designed, you know, where you have

00:17:21.220 the conservatives, they're kind of the dad and the liberals that are kind of the mom.

00:17:24.340 And it's like, no one wants to be tyrannically run by either of them, but you know, one seems a

00:17:29.340 little crazy right now. So, you know, a lot of times the, the, the pushback isn't that bad. And

00:17:34.120 me personally, I'm like, would be more of a freedom versus safety person personally,

00:17:37.700 you know, and I don't necessarily need to like impose the way that I think on everyone.

00:17:42.640 But that's one of the reasons I moved to America instead of Canada, because, you know, I'm like,

00:17:46.680 you know, I think that freedom and liberty are important and individualism and stuff like that.

00:17:51.320 But if you get to a scenario where they go, one of these gangs is going to rule over you.

00:17:56.660 And, and then all of a sudden you're fighting. It's like in the, anything, all of the fights between

00:18:02.520 people happen. Like the truth is everyone wants to say that everyone argues in these racial groups

00:18:06.500 hate each other. Truth is everyone gets along pretty well until you say, we're going to pick

00:18:10.960 one of us and everyone else has to live that way. You know, as long as people get to live their own

00:18:15.400 life the way they want to, we all get along pretty well when we're not being imposed each other's

00:18:18.640 beliefs on each other. And I like this idea of the left is the mom, you know, but it's like that,

00:18:23.300 not like the most nurturing mom in the world, like kind of a little more of an overbearing mom.

00:18:27.660 I just, did you see this thing that was going around on Instagram where women were posting

00:18:32.740 like black and white hot photos of themselves and with the hashtag challenge accepted. Like

00:18:39.740 it was like a challenge, you know, to post a selfie on Instagram. That's that to me, that's,

00:18:44.020 that's the way that the mom is the left right now. It's like the mom posting the selfie saying that

00:18:47.900 it's, they're really brave and stunning and beautiful.

00:18:51.200 Yeah. And they're the mom. There's also the mom that's like telling you that you need to wear a

00:18:56.720 skateboard helmet if you're going to, you know, just skateboard on the driveway.

00:18:59.260 Yeah. But then they're also like, more importantly, all your friends need to wear them. And if your

00:19:03.000 friends don't have them, I don't want you hanging around those kids anymore. 0.86

00:19:05.680 Yeah. I don't like Johnny. You stay away from Johnny. And, and Johnny had a tweet two years ago.

00:19:11.260 Yeah. Yeah. He's going to tell you some, he's going to tell you some Simpsons quotes.

00:19:17.260 Like, so that's, this is my worry for comedy though, is like your stuff's great. You know, a lot of,

00:19:22.840 actually not a lot, but a number of other guys are putting out great stuff these days.

00:19:26.560 Yeah. But, you know, Christopher Hitchens, when he once said that women aren't funny, 0.89

00:19:32.260 he made this distinction between being funny and having a sense of humor. And those are,

00:19:38.060 those are two different things, right? To be funny, you make people laugh. To have a sense of humor,

00:19:42.520 you understand comedy and you laugh yourself and you can, you can laugh period. Are we in a kind of

00:19:49.340 dangerous situation here in comedy? Because I noticed there are, there are still funny people,

00:19:53.280 but like half the country maybe. And it's not totally along ideological lines, but it's pretty

00:20:01.140 close. It seems to me, we haven't lost our ability to be funny. We've lost our ability

00:20:05.720 to have a sense of humor and to understand comedy, which seems necessary for comedy to thrive.

00:20:12.240 I love how you squeaked in that women aren't funny. 1.00

00:20:14.980 I always say with the women that, that Christopher Hitchens thing, I know, I know what he's trying 1.00

00:20:23.360 to say a little bit, but standup comedy, it's almost more so that standup comedy is a masculine

00:20:28.140 art form and more men want to do it. So you kind of, there's, there's a lot at play why there's

00:20:32.660 more men, you know, the one of the, it's just like anything. It's like, it's not just one thing,

00:20:36.520 but I know a ton of girls that are hilarious. It's just sometimes going in front of a room full 1.00

00:20:40.400 of people and yelling at like, that's a masculine art form to begin with, whether, whether girl or

00:20:44.940 guy. Well, it's funny, you know, that's kind of the point Hitchens was making is like people

00:20:48.500 totally misunderstood his point, which his point actually wasn't the headline. Women aren't funny. 1.00

00:20:53.200 His point was standup comedy tends to be a more masculine art form. So he gave examples of women

00:20:59.700 who are funny, but yeah, there's tons of girls that are, I mean, I'm, I have lots of friends that

00:21:04.760 are like super funny. Of course that does get misinterpreted and weaponized sometimes. And I'm probably part of

00:21:09.900 it. I do a podcast called the boys, guys, and I'm like, women suck. And sometimes it's like, 1.00

00:21:13.860 yeah, it's like, that's not what I meant though. Yeah. I just, I just think the guys rule girls 0.98

00:21:20.020 are always like girl power. I'm like, how about dudes rule? That's my new movement. You're not

00:21:23.280 invited. It's so brave, stunning and brave in terms of, yeah. Yeah. In terms of the most people,

00:21:30.180 because standup comedy should be, especially, especially in a live setting is a, you make jokes

00:21:36.040 that you think are funny and then your conscience allows you to make, like you feel

00:21:39.600 you know what? That was the right joke. The same way that when you're with your friends,

00:21:42.460 you make fun of each other, but there might be a time where you go, ah, you know what? I,

00:21:46.500 he didn't even blow up, but I kind of felt bad when I said that that fell over the line. So you

00:21:50.040 have your own conscience of what you think it makes sense. And then the audience has gets to vote on

00:21:54.860 whether they like it with their one vote, their laughter. The problem is other people that weren't

00:21:59.580 there now think they get to vote. They get to like watch it afterwards and be like, that was wrong.

00:22:05.220 And you go, well, there was a democratic vote in that audience on laughter. And the vote was,

00:22:09.820 they liked it. And you go, well, they're wrong. They're stupid. Those people are stupid and they're

00:22:15.380 racist. And you, what about the black guy? He hates himself. And that's what these people are

00:22:21.040 doing. But most people for the most part actually aren't that crazy, but they're afraid. But if you're

00:22:26.380 good at comedy and you know, it is tough to do, but if you're good at comedy, you can make people

00:22:31.800 feel comfortable. And you're like, Hey guys, we're going to laugh at everything right now.

00:22:36.620 And it does, it's not because we're bad people. It's because we're fun people.

00:22:41.300 That's a great point. I haven't seen before that, that similarity between comedy and politics,

00:22:46.660 which is that it's all about the circumstances, right? It's all about the context. I mean, like it's

00:22:52.100 actually the example you use is direct, which is there's a democratic vote in the comedy club.

00:22:57.240 If they laugh, it worked. If they don't laugh, it didn't work. There's a democratic vote in

00:23:01.180 politics. You know, if you get elected, then you've said something that resonates with people

00:23:04.680 and that might change over time. Something that's funny 30 years ago might not be funny today.

00:23:10.220 Some politician who got elected 30 years ago might not get elected today, but how insane is it to go

00:23:16.600 back and say, yeah, you told a joke 15 years ago and now I don't like it and you're dead and I'm

00:23:23.180 going to ruin you and ruin your life. Yeah. Cause the context is different, right? Cause you know,

00:23:28.420 it's a lot of times you're not with the comedy. You're not even so much. People talk about it being

00:23:33.380 like a truth telling art form, but it's, it's not about so sometimes it's not so much about telling

00:23:37.980 the truth as much as being not forced to tell lies. Cause it's more like everyone's it's like if,

00:23:43.720 uh, you know, sometimes you'll see it in, in, you know, the body positivity movement with women or 0.99

00:23:48.740 whatever, they'll go, this girl's so beautiful. And you go, all right, whatever. Like, you know what

00:23:51.740 I mean? And they're like, no, but say it though. You have to say it. You have to believe it.

00:23:56.020 Yeah. And you go, okay, I don't care if you want to say that and think that, but when you need me to

00:24:01.280 now say it, that's what's becoming a problem. So it's like, if you want to go like your thing that

00:24:05.920 you like fine, but when you need to go, no, but you need to say it's good. And I think that's like a lot

00:24:10.680 of times what it's pushing back against because the context is different. I wouldn't, I'm not like

00:24:14.940 a need to tell the truth. If I'm with someone that's, you know, that person, let's say a two

00:24:19.780 out of 10 girl, I don't, I don't like, Hey, you're gross. Cause I'm a truth teller and I need to say

00:24:24.280 that's not how I feel. But if 10 people are in my face being like, tell her she's beautiful. I,

00:24:30.200 then I might be like, well, she's not though. Stop making me beyond. I don't want to be honest.

00:24:35.660 I don't want to say anything, but yeah, I mean, it's, I, I mentioned it earlier. Now it's become

00:24:39.420 a kind of cliche is this idea of stunning and brave, you know, that basically there's this

00:24:44.120 kind of, I don't know, politically correct orthodoxy that makes you say, I guess it started

00:24:49.400 really with, with Caitlyn Jenner is you say, okay, Bruce Jenner wants to go by Caitlyn Jenner now.

00:24:54.280 All right. Doesn't really bother me. It doesn't, you know, no big deal. I have other things that I

00:24:58.400 think about, but it's when you're told that you have to say this, this woman is stunning and brave.

00:25:06.120 Yeah. I mean, even I think Norm, Norm MacDonald had a bit on this. He was like, look, you know,

00:25:09.820 they want me to say that she's brave and beautiful and, uh, uh, maybe she's brave, but

00:25:15.060 like how many 60 something year old women do you know who are like really, really hot? Not too many, 1.00

00:25:21.040 you know, in their own way, but, but not, not too many. Yeah. That's it's, it's just a culture of

00:25:25.600 lies that's being, being foisted on people. And that kind of makes you react.

00:25:29.980 Yeah. And people are like over it, you know? So when you give them the permission to not, uh,

00:25:34.940 say that, cause a lot of times, uh, you know, comedy can be like a pressure release valve,

00:25:38.920 right? Cause there's so much of, uh, people feel like they're being gaslit, right? It's kind of,

00:25:43.600 so sometimes it's just nice to go up and hear someone kind of say those things the same way that

00:25:48.340 if you, let's say me and you had a mutual friend who was, he's all right, you know,

00:25:52.520 not maybe the guy number four in the group and so, and everyone's coming up to you and they're

00:25:57.740 like, this guy's the best. All of a sudden you find yourself in your head, like what? And then

00:26:02.040 everyone's telling you that. And then, so that's making you feel crazy. But then when someone else

00:26:05.620 comes up, like, Hey, he just had a really bad day. So we're just trying to get bump them up and you

00:26:09.500 go, Oh yeah. Great guy. Yeah. He's awesome. I just don't want to feel crazy. Yeah. Yeah. A lot of times,

00:26:15.760 you know, when just hearing someone push back against these things is enough to sort of,

00:26:20.600 you know, because sometimes you're in your workplace, you're like, am I crazy? Because

00:26:24.640 you feel, has everyone lost their minds? It starts to make you feel crazy because you're being like

00:26:28.740 gaslit by society sometimes. Yeah. It is that gaslighting. I think, you know, sometimes the

00:26:32.700 right gets knocked for being too, too blunt or, you know, they're, they're, they're considered mean

00:26:39.240 or impolite, but it's not that we'd be happy to be polite. It's just don't like relieve yourself on my

00:26:45.380 leg and tell me it's raining. Just let me know what you're doing and that it's not, I'm not,

00:26:49.740 I'm not completely out of my mind and we can go along and be nice and all have a nice civil

00:26:54.180 society. Yeah. I think that everyone works a little better when they're the push. I mean,

00:26:59.480 it's a weird scenario because obviously the Trump's in power, so you have your Republicans in power,

00:27:02.880 but the liberals clearly controlled thought and everything else. Yeah. Yeah. So you have a,

00:27:08.220 it's kind of, it feels like for me, like the whole woke church. It's the reason why people are so

00:27:12.560 threatened is because they have their bishop positions in that church. And then, and they're saying,

00:27:16.780 you know, here's our list of things. And I'm kind of saying, Hey, we have a bar down the street where

00:27:22.000 we're, we're all kind of partying and it's really fun. And everyone's leaving to go hang out at that

00:27:26.120 bar. And they're like, just so you know, you're, we're going to, we're going to call you the worst

00:27:29.860 things if you leave, because they, they know if you leave, it's a bishop position and they go,

00:27:33.740 that's the devil there. And you go, well, it's not really that we're just having fun over here.

00:27:36.920 And they're like, well, you can't. Well, if, if it hasn't happened already, Ryan,

00:27:41.880 I'm pretty sure that this conversation will get us both excommunicated by the bishops.

00:27:49.280 You're cursing me. I know. Well, whatever though, you can at least go hang out at the bar and the

00:27:54.700 bar will be pretty fun down the street. We'll, we'll leave it there. I've taken up a ton of your

00:27:59.120 time, but I, I do encourage everybody go check out Ryan Longman. His stuff is really great.

00:28:06.020 They can find you Ryan on YouTube. They can find you at your podcast,

00:28:10.260 the boys cast with Ryan Long. Where else? MySpace, Zanga, LiveJournal.

00:28:14.320 I try to, you know, I try to root everything to those two things. You know, I'm going to be

00:28:17.840 touring a lot as soon as this comes back, but youtube.com slash Ryan Long comedy,

00:28:22.020 Instagram, Twitter, a Tik TOK parlor. I got them all at Ryan Long comedy.

00:28:26.800 Cool. I hit a video every single Monday morning at a 10 Eastern standard time.

00:28:32.080 Go check it out. 10 Eastern. I'm trying to figure out if that conflicts with my show.

00:28:35.640 Well, if it does right after my show, then go out and check out Ryan's stuff.

00:28:40.440 Dude. Great. Great to talk to you. Keep up the great work. Really funny stuff.

00:28:44.100 And we'll have to have you back soon.

00:28:45.820 I appreciate it, dude. I'll see you soon.

00:28:47.360 All right.

00:28:47.640 Bye.

00:28:48.640 Bye.

00:28:49.640 Bye.

00:28:50.640 Bye.

00:28:51.640 Bye.

00:28:52.640 Bye.

00:28:53.640 Bye.

00:28:54.640 Bye.

00:28:55.640 Bye.

00:28:56.640 Bye.

00:28:57.640 Bye.

00:28:58.640 Bye.

00:28:59.640 Bye.

00:29:00.640 Bye.

00:29:01.640 Bye.

00:29:02.640 Bye.

00:29:03.640 Bye.

The Michael Knowles Show - March 06, 2021

Anti-WOKE Comedy and Going Viral ｜ Ryan Long

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