TRIGGERnometry - Andrew Doyle on Woke Comedy, Left vs Identity Politics and Free Speech

00:00:00.000 hello and welcome to trigonometry i'm francis foster i'm constantin kissin and this is the

00:00:11.460 show for you if you're bored of people arguing on the internet over subjects they know nothing

00:00:15.980 about at trigonometry we don't pretend to be the experts we ask the experts our fantastic guest

00:00:22.460 this week for the first returning episode of season two of trigonometry is a returning guest

00:00:27.680 He's a comedian.

00:00:28.480 He was a co-writer for Jonathan Pye.

00:00:30.700 Andrew Doyle, welcome to Trigonometry.

00:00:32.180 Hello.

00:00:32.920 It's so good to have you back, man.

00:00:34.280 Yeah, it's good to be back.

00:00:35.140 It's fun.

00:00:35.620 And you've changed the design since I was here before.

00:00:37.780 Yeah, we've reworked the studio.

00:00:39.280 We're very excited about it.

00:00:40.440 It's good.

00:00:40.760 It's very sexy.

00:00:41.620 Thank you.

00:00:42.180 Due to off-camera issues.

00:00:43.720 But there we go.

00:00:44.660 Oh, right.

00:00:45.100 Okay, fine.

00:00:45.880 So normally what we do when we start off our chats with guests is we ask them a little

00:00:51.020 bit about them, where they're from, all the rest of it.

00:00:53.980 But we've chatted to you before, so our guests will know.

00:00:56.340 and things seem to be brewing in the comedy world at the moment.

00:01:00.900 Most definitely.

00:01:01.560 Yeah, would you just explain to our viewers

00:01:03.860 who might not be aware of everything that's going on, what's happening?

00:01:07.340 Yeah, well, I run a comedy night called Comedy Unleashed,

00:01:10.180 which is once a month in Bethnal Green at the Backyard Comedy Club.

00:01:14.340 Let's get the plug in right at the top. 1.00

00:01:15.800 Yeah, I thought that, well, I'm a cynic, that's what I'm here for.

00:01:19.580 And we run this night, and the whole point of the night is

00:01:22.180 we felt that on the comedy circuit at the moment,

00:01:24.960 there's a kind of homogenous quality about the the the politics that you'll get in a particular

00:01:29.240 comedy night so you know if you go along to a standard comedy night there's not going to be

00:01:33.800 many sort of pro-brexit comedians there's not going to be many sort of right-wing comedians

00:01:37.820 and we were interested to set up a night where you can have all sorts of people so we have

00:01:41.640 lots of left-wing lots of right-wing pro-brexit anti-brexit all the rest that we try and really

00:01:46.760 get a we make a real effort uh to get a breadth and we and the same goes for the audience that

00:01:52.360 we're sort of cultivating there's a real breadth of opinion there which is really refreshing I

00:01:56.520 think but also we encourage we say it's a free speech night and what we really mean by that

00:01:59.880 is that we're encouraging comics not to self-censor right but I don't think it is true that comics are

00:02:06.040 being censored as such I think what's happening is culturally we're creating a situation where

00:02:11.300 comics feel they can't talk about certain issues for fear of their career right they they want to

00:02:15.940 get on TV they want to they want to win the awards and if we're and if we're in this new woke

00:02:21.000 culture they won't get that far if um if they talk about the wrong issues so we're saying don't worry

00:02:26.040 about that this night come along say whatever you want experiment maybe you'll get it wrong

00:02:29.780 uh but just go for it and that's our that's our point so what we but of course by setting up this

00:02:35.760 night we've been accused of being a right-wing night okay so um we had an article in the sunday

00:02:42.240 telegraph came out as soon as we announced the night and it said thank god there's a right-wing

00:02:46.100 comedy night and it's run by me and andy shaw two lefties right but somehow we've and most of our

00:02:51.780 acts have been left wing simply because most comics are left wing right so we've but we we

00:02:56.280 are trying our best to sort of broaden it out but it's fascinating to me that once you say the word

00:03:00.520 free speech you're branded as being on the right it's it's a bizarre and awful situation and i think

00:03:06.620 it says a lot about the left the left have not only have the left failed to defend free speech

00:03:11.200 of late in the past say 10 years or so but they've actually been actively hostile to it

00:03:15.260 and that means that the only people you get defending free speech are these right-wing

00:03:19.040 reactionaries some some awful people and some good people on the right as well I should say

00:03:23.040 but there are some poisonous people as well who defend it probably for the wrong reasons because

00:03:27.300 actually people on the far right aren't pro-free speech at all and they can use this disingenuously

00:03:31.560 to advance their agenda and that's a problem so then when you stand up like people like me when

00:03:36.440 I say everyone should have the right to say anything and the state should have absolutely

00:03:39.960 no business in interfering with what you say or what you think i'm branded a fascist where there's

00:03:45.420 a fundamental incoherence to that isn't there because what i'm saying is the opposite of

00:03:49.000 fascism um so what are you gonna do so that's what's happening in the comedy world at the

00:03:53.320 moment you described woke culture now there's one word that pisses me off it's a term woke 0.96

00:03:59.280 fucking annoying isn't it it's just horrendous and also up until recently you wouldn't be able

00:04:04.080 to use it without being ironic you know it was it was a word that like a couple of years ago when 0.90

00:04:07.380 you said woke it was like a joke word wasn't it was it was it was it's actually quite an old word

00:04:11.340 it goes back many decades but but these days the way it's used at the moment is this sort of right

00:04:16.800 on culture this sort of trendy social justice yeah that sort of thing the problem is now people

00:04:24.640 are using it unironically and that really upsets me the the other thing that's happening in comedy

00:04:30.080 I think at the moment, is there is an attempt by the establishment to embrace woke culture.

00:04:39.000 Woke culture is the establishment. So we have to be really clear about this. So

00:04:42.040 we can say, yes, we've got a right wing government, you know, America's got a right

00:04:46.180 wing president. OK, so the right are in control. Well, actually, no, because in terms of culture,

00:04:51.800 culturally, it's actually the woke and they're not really leftist, but let's call them woke

00:04:56.360 center leftist, whatever you want to call them,

00:04:58.660 identitarian leftists, right?

00:05:00.780 They have the clout, culturally,

00:05:02.740 because it infects everything. They're in the Conservative

00:05:04.640 Party, even. You know, the Conservative Party

00:05:06.600 has woke ideas, right?

00:05:08.660 Labour, as well. Labour, who, you know,

00:05:10.500 they'll charge an extra £10. Hold on, just for anyone

00:05:12.560 who's watching this and they're going away, conservative

00:05:14.540 work, like, give us an example of a

00:05:16.600 woke idea that the Conservatives have embraced.

00:05:18.540 The Gender Recognition Act, for instance, the idea

00:05:20.480 that you can choose your own gender

00:05:22.700 just by making the statement.

00:05:24.140 and they pushed that through.

00:05:26.980 That's a woke idea.

00:05:29.060 It was the Conservatives that pushed through gay marriage, 1.00

00:05:31.980 for goodness sake.

00:05:33.180 They don't have traditionally conservative views

00:05:35.440 when it comes to social policy.

00:05:37.180 So I'm saying that these ideas,

00:05:38.980 and also you've got to remember that if,

00:05:41.640 we are now living in the culture

00:05:42.780 where people will dig up your old tweets

00:05:44.680 and find things that you've said

00:05:46.260 that might have offended someone

00:05:47.320 and they will threaten your livelihood for it

00:05:50.780 and they will harass you online for it

00:05:52.360 and they'll make sure that you can't function in society anymore.

00:05:55.640 Both the Conservatives and Labour are essentially anti-free speech now.

00:05:59.560 They're both pro-hate speech legislation.

00:06:02.300 They want to be able to curb what people say.

00:06:03.880 They want to be able to arrest people.

00:06:05.540 And they're doing nothing about the fact that hate speech as currently defined is based on perception.

00:06:11.060 So if you perceive that someone has offended you,

00:06:13.300 and if you perceive that you think that person was motivated by prejudice,

00:06:17.340 then they've committed a hate crime, right?

00:06:19.360 So this is not a liberal position to hold.

00:06:21.800 this is a woke position to hold and it's there in in all of the major political forces so actually

00:06:27.320 this is where the power lies right this this is establishment so when we we talk all the time in

00:06:33.820 comedy about punching up and punching down right and i i always in my comedy i always punch i always

00:06:38.120 punch up right because i think satirically it's more interesting to have a go at the people in

00:06:41.800 power so when i'm having a go at woke culture which i do all the time people say yeah you're

00:06:45.560 punching down aren't you you're attacking vulnerable people no i'm punching up very much

00:06:49.100 punching up I'm punching up because I'm attacking the people who will who will 0.95

00:06:52.360 destroy your life if you say the wrong thing I'm punching up at the 0.83

00:06:56.100 authoritarians who want to police your speech who want to dictate what when you

00:07:01.420 can say things and how you can say things and what you can think and if you

00:07:04.580 need evidence that this is this is not a major movement within the comedy

00:07:08.120 establishment let's take the last Edinburgh Fringe Festival last year

00:07:11.900 which was opened with a speech by Nika Burns who is the head of the comedy

00:07:16.260 awards where she said she was looking forward to the new woke uh future of comedy uh she was

00:07:21.660 looking forward to the new young comic setting the parameters of what is acceptable and unacceptable

00:07:25.660 right that's where and that's that's the establishment that's where the awards are

00:07:30.200 going to go to work i have been for the last few years by the way i've been going to woke

00:07:32.980 it's not about can i just say i'm really woke that means i get an award i will do whatever it

00:07:40.380 It's not going to help you. You're a straight white man.

00:07:42.220 No, I don't. I don't identify.

00:07:43.500 It's not about politics now.

00:07:47.640 I mean, it's the way that, say, someone like Brian Logan at The Guardian,

00:07:50.280 who just reviews on the basis of his politics how much he agrees or disagrees.

00:07:54.340 And he's not really qualified to be a comedy critic, I'm afraid.

00:07:57.480 Well, let's unpack a little bit of what you're talking about,

00:07:59.600 because I hear everything you're saying.

00:08:01.280 I personally agree with everything that you've said.

00:08:03.720 I remember hearing you talk about this woke comedy being promoted by the Edinburgh Fringe,

00:08:11.060 which is the biggest arts festival in the world, if you don't know.

00:08:14.020 And I was like, oh, yeah, okay, whatever.

00:08:16.060 And then when the case happened with me, which went viral recently,

00:08:19.800 I was actually attacked by a few of these woke comics online. 0.97

00:08:23.200 And I went and I read this letter, the speech. 0.99

00:08:28.340 It was fucking horrifying. 0.99

00:08:29.860 It's incredible, isn't it? Because also, she made the comparison with the alternative 0.99

00:08:34.920 comedy movement of the 80s. Now, this is such a massive misunderstanding. The alternative

00:08:38.980 comedy movement was pushing against the establishment. You had people who were overtly racist and

00:08:44.640 homophobic and all the rest, and they were the mainstream. And the alternative comics

00:08:49.520 were saying, no, we're not doing that anymore. We're going to push against that. So it was

00:08:52.740 punk. It was pushing against the establishment. I'm saying woke is the establishment. It's

00:08:58.860 absolutely not pushing against the establishment to be a woke comic because

00:09:02.420 you you there's no risk there it's it anything that is avant-garde or is

00:09:06.240 pushing the arts forward has to be has to have some sense of personal risk

00:09:09.360 about it right if you're gonna win the awards and get all the jobs and get on

00:09:12.660 TV for saying these things that's not punk that is that is the establishment

00:09:17.940 exactly and this is why I bring this up because my sense having played your

00:09:20.980 night a couple of times is that the people in the comedy world who are now

00:09:25.760 trying to do what you are doing,

00:09:27.960 which is to introduce a different type of comedy,

00:09:30.160 to allow people the space to be creative,

00:09:33.180 to try things, to be wrong, to cross the line.

00:09:36.900 You know, that seems to be, to me,

00:09:39.860 the new punk in the comedy.

00:09:41.840 It absolutely is.

00:09:42.400 And my sense is that what you've created

00:09:44.380 and why I'm so pleased to have been involved with

00:09:46.200 and why we wanted to have you back on the show

00:09:47.900 is that this is the start of a new movement in comedy.

00:09:51.040 Yeah, it's a new alternative comedy movement.

00:09:52.840 And the reactionaries on the identitarian left

00:09:55.740 will push back and say what you are doing is just trying to rehabilitate the old Bernard Manning

00:09:59.700 style of comic. I've been told this is a racist comedy night. We haven't had a single racist act.

00:10:04.520 I wouldn't be interested. I'm not going to put a racist on stage just to spout racism. It's not

00:10:08.500 funny or interesting artistically, OK? What we're saying is we're cultivating an audience that

00:10:13.320 understand that when a comic talks about race, they're not necessarily being racist. It is to

00:10:18.800 resist this kind of literal minded, degraded view of stand-up comedy. People who don't know what

00:10:23.900 comedy is people who don't know that you're playing with ideas comics are often teasing

00:10:27.780 those parameters of what is acceptable and what is not and by by delving into those areas uh you

00:10:33.520 are they remind us of why we believe the things we believe yeah and and and sometimes shock is a

00:10:40.080 really powerful comedic tool but if i'm sitting there in an audience and i'm i hear some stuff

00:10:44.820 that is potentially treading that line you know towing that line of what is acceptable

00:10:49.480 if my first instinct is oh it's obviously a bigot i'm going to storm out whatever then

00:10:53.860 then I consider that really it's a form of philistinism what I what audiences

00:10:59.260 should be learning about comedy is that oh yeah why is that person doing this

00:11:02.740 what are they trying to achieve there and and maybe it's a bit more

00:11:05.200 satirically interesting than you think so I think our audience the ones that

00:11:08.560 we have now that come back month after month are smart and they get what's

00:11:12.040 going on they're good people not these alt-right sort of white nationalists

00:11:16.960 which is what they've been accused of being and that's the way I think comedy

00:11:21.700 you go. This is new. It's exciting. It's pushing back against the establishment. And I hope that

00:11:27.120 it'll catch on. I love shopping for new jackets and boots this season. And when I do, I always

00:11:32.340 make sure I get cash back with Rakuten. And it's not just fashion. You can earn cash back on

00:11:37.340 electronics, beauty, travel, and more at stores like Sephora, Old Navy, and Expedia. It's so easy

00:11:43.180 to save that I always shop through Rakuten. Join for free at rakuten.ca and get your cash back by

00:11:48.820 interact e-transfer paypal or check download the rakuten app or sign up at rakuten.ca that's r-a-k-u-t-e-n

00:11:56.800 dot c-a where do you think it is going to go before sorry francis what what do you what do

00:12:01.220 you see looking forward uh well it's difficult because i think the people who oppose what we're

00:12:06.420 doing uh will slur will use the slurs the usual technique and they'll they'll call us alt right

00:12:11.660 and they do all of that and they've already been doing it because once you associate someone with

00:12:15.520 that label, it means you don't have to talk to them anymore. I'm not interested, politically,

00:12:20.120 I'm not interested in sitting down and debating and talking to a fascist, right? Because that's

00:12:24.560 like trying to tell a religious person that God doesn't exist, okay? There's no point. You're

00:12:29.240 dealing with someone who is not being reasonable. They're not capable of debate. If you surrender

00:12:32.900 reason, you are no longer capable of debate, which, by the way, is the major problem of the

00:12:36.060 identitarian left. They have no reason, therefore debating them is pointless because they're 0.93

00:12:39.760 zealots. It's a cult. So it gets very, very... I mean, I try my best, I do, but you hit a brick wall

00:12:46.340 again and again. Sorry, what the hell was I talking about? I talked about the night and...

00:12:52.640 Yeah. Where do you see it going in terms of...

00:12:55.080 Okay, well, I think what will happen is more and more the identitarian left will double down 1.00

00:13:01.140 and say, this is pandering to the far right, or you're useful idiots for the far right, etc. 0.99

00:13:06.920 etc and they will ultimately try and destroy it in that way I'm not talking 1.00

00:13:14.800 about just my night I think I'm talking generally more generally about anyone

00:13:17.980 who tries to react against the woke establishment form of comedy so that

00:13:22.620 would be any comic who and it's nothing to do with me actually it's any comic

00:13:25.480 who individually tries to do that you know they'll make sure they don't get

00:13:28.160 booked though I mean we've had comics had their employers contacted because of

00:13:32.040 things they've said on stage and all of this is based on a misunderstanding of

00:13:36.160 comedy. Francis I know you've been I know I've been asking questions let me just finish this

00:13:40.240 line of thought. You're totally dominating. Yeah you are yeah it's disgusting. You're being

00:13:44.460 marginalised. Yeah I am I've been impressed and marginalised by a Russian. Yeah I will I will be 0.56

00:13:50.680 quiet for a while but I just want to finish this line of questioning because what I also see though

00:13:55.840 is let's quickly talk about what happened with me refusing to sign the SOAS contract. The behavioural

00:14:02.660 agreement form. The behavioral agreement form. For anyone who doesn't know, I was invited to do a gig.

00:14:06.900 I turned down the contract because the contract they offered me required me to not do any of the

00:14:12.080 12 isms. It said that you couldn't criticize religion. You couldn't criticize atheists

00:14:17.560 because there's a marginalized group that really need protecting. And they said that all jokes have

00:14:22.420 to be respectful and kind, right? So I turned it down. It went viral. And here's the reason I bring

00:14:26.140 it up. My sense is very strongly that the mood in the country, in the public at large,

00:14:31.640 is very much with what we are doing.

00:14:34.360 So when you talk about this identitarian left

00:14:36.940 being opposed to it, I hear that, I understand that.

00:14:39.980 But I think you may be exaggerating the threat

00:14:42.700 because I think the vast majority of the public,

00:14:44.660 actually, as the story with me shows, are totally on side.

00:14:47.700 But this is the problem because actually it is a minority,

00:14:50.600 but it's a very vocal minority,

00:14:52.100 and it's the minority with the clout.

00:14:54.040 So these are the people who are active online. 0.99

00:14:56.880 I mean, most people don't give a shit about this stuff, 0.97

00:14:58.280 and they don't go chasing people online and harassing them, 0.98

00:15:00.060 But the ones that make a noise really do.

00:15:02.040 And they can damage your livelihood.

00:15:03.360 They can.

00:15:04.060 They have that power.

00:15:05.680 So I totally agree with you.

00:15:06.620 It's not many people.

00:15:09.760 But it's the same as Silicon Valley and the tech giants, right?

00:15:13.500 They have an unbelievable amount of power about public discourse.

00:15:16.760 You know, the Internet and the social media is the de facto public square now.

00:15:20.420 But you have 20 or 30 people in an office in Silicon Valley

00:15:22.940 who all have identical political leanings controlling what is acceptable and what is not.

00:15:27.960 I mean, Twitter call it healthy conversation.

00:15:30.520 They have a thing called the Trust and Safety Council.

00:15:32.760 How could they have come up with anything more scary as a title than that?

00:15:35.980 A patron have a Trust and Safety Council.

00:15:37.900 This is scary Stalinist stuff.

00:15:40.880 And they control and they are seeking to control and they are doubling down

00:15:44.620 and they are kicking people off their platforms who don't ideologically follow their line.

00:15:49.440 We know that now. I mean, it's now become nakedly obvious.

00:15:52.520 And people can say that's a conspiracy theory.

00:15:54.040 No, but the evidence is in now, I'm afraid.

00:15:55.420 and that's the problem

00:15:58.160 is that small numbers of people with the power

00:16:00.240 that's why you need to punch up at those people

00:16:02.440 and I think you're right 1.00

00:16:03.500 that most people see this as just bullshit 0.99

00:16:06.340 they won't even know what it means really 0.99

00:16:07.580 a lot of this stuff

00:16:08.180 what woke stuff means

00:16:09.200 but you wouldn't know that

00:16:10.460 by looking on social media

00:16:11.460 or the media generally would you

00:16:12.920 or the BBC

00:16:13.760 you know

00:16:14.600 Francis all the questions from now on

00:16:16.380 are from you

00:16:16.720 no it's alright mate

00:16:17.640 you carry on

00:16:18.260 I'm going to get myself a cup of tea

00:16:19.560 yeah you shouldn't even be here

00:16:20.760 yeah exactly

00:16:21.820 in fact I should have made you sign a behavioural agreement

00:16:24.360 can I just say on that

00:16:26.820 on the behavioural agreement form

00:16:27.980 a lot of the arguments I always hear back about this

00:16:31.020 is yeah but they're within their rights

00:16:33.100 to have a night and say what sort of

00:16:35.200 acts they want and I agree with that too

00:16:37.240 so do I

00:16:37.640 but then if they do that everyone else has the right

00:16:40.980 to take the piss and criticise and say

00:16:42.880 this isn't what comedy is about

00:16:43.940 that's called free speech we both get to do it

00:16:46.380 I get this all the time like whenever I

00:16:47.860 criticise someone who's attacking free speech or something

00:16:50.540 all the time people say oh clearly

00:16:52.780 what about their free speech, eh?

00:16:54.100 Well, I'm not shutting them down.

00:16:55.800 I'm criticising them or ridiculing them.

00:16:57.440 That's allowed.

00:16:58.060 That's how it works. 1.00

00:16:59.380 This stupid myth that to criticise 1.00

00:17:02.040 is damaging someone's free speech is incredible. 1.00

00:17:04.840 But they do have a lot of power, these people,

00:17:07.020 and we saw that in particular.

00:17:08.340 And the thing that startled me

00:17:09.820 was how they went after The Simpsons,

00:17:11.440 in particular the character of Apu,

00:17:13.040 and saying, you know, this is racist

00:17:15.020 and it's disgraceful,

00:17:17.560 he shouldn't be allowed to be on the show.

00:17:19.320 But the fascinating thing with Apu is

00:17:20.880 if you take the character, look at the character of Ralph Wiggum.

00:17:23.540 Now, Ralph Wiggum is essentially, and I'm a former teacher,

00:17:26.500 Ralph Wiggum is a child with learning difficulties.

00:17:29.080 He's a child who, back then you would have said is slow,

00:17:31.820 now you would say has global learning delay.

00:17:33.900 It's quite obvious that he has problems and difficulties with his learning.

00:17:38.260 Ralph Wiggum is also probably the funniest character in the show.

00:17:42.140 So if you were going to target Ralph, if you're going to target Apu,

00:17:45.520 you're going to target Ralph Wiggum.

00:17:46.840 If you're going to target Ralph Wiggum,

00:17:48.180 you're also going to say about Mr Burns.

00:17:49.700 he's a very old man and we're laughing at a man who has osteoporosis it will never end it's also

00:17:55.720 that that is a show that is comprised of stereotypes and and what's funny about that is

00:18:00.140 it's the this is an excellent example of that literal minded interpretation that i'm talking

00:18:04.760 about uh a poo is a stereotype yes of course he is that's the joke and it's actually the opposite

00:18:10.220 of what they think it is it's not reinforcing a negative pernicious stereotype it's it's mocking

00:18:14.540 the fact that we have them and it's it's that kind of literal mind is inability to understand

00:18:18.820 satire or comedy. Do you know what? I think we should introduce comedy classes into schools

00:18:22.060 so that people understand what comedy is and that it's not literally the actual truth, right?

00:18:27.740 But this is also another good example of how they do have clout because guess what?

00:18:31.820 Apu is going. He's gone, right? If it were the case that this is just something that I'm sort

00:18:36.420 of just making up, there's no real issue here, right? Why has that happened? Why is Kevin Hart

00:18:41.940 no longer hosting the Oscars? Why is this stuff going on? No, they have clout. Real serious power.

00:18:47.120 And it's also interesting as well

00:18:49.500 We've talked about Ralph

00:18:50.700 But the way they seem to attack it

00:18:53.540 Let's talk about marginalised groups

00:18:54.860 But actually Bumblebee Man

00:18:56.940 Is still in The Simpsons

00:18:58.660 And Bumblebee Man, I mean I'm half Latino

00:19:00.780 I love Bumblebee Man

00:19:02.200 But all he really says is the words

00:19:03.860 In a really over the top Mexican accent 0.98

00:19:08.040 But you have a president

00:19:10.100 Saying that

00:19:11.080 Some immigrants from Mexico 0.99

00:19:13.500 Coming in are rapists 1.00

00:19:14.640 they're actually far more racist to Mexicans 1.00

00:19:17.360 and Latinos than they are to Asian people 0.99

00:19:18.960 because it's selective outrage isn't it

00:19:20.860 and it's to do with intersectionality

00:19:23.240 where do you lie on the

00:19:25.200 grievance spectrum and is it worth

00:19:27.140 defending you and it's 0.96

00:19:28.560 incredibly hypocritical as a movement 0.80

00:19:31.140 but that's a very good example 0.94

00:19:33.100 I'm glad they're not going after Bumblebee Man

00:19:35.140 although it will get there eventually

00:19:37.000 they'll come for everyone 0.94

00:19:38.740 no one cares about Latinos 1.00

00:19:39.920 you have to get over that

00:19:41.480 no one cares

00:19:44.580 But actually...

00:19:46.180 What a statement.

00:19:47.240 Yeah, it is.

00:19:48.040 Actually, Russians care.

00:19:49.180 Venezuela and Russia have a very close political alliance.

00:19:52.040 But anyway, that's something that I wanted to touch on.

00:19:54.940 I'm half Venezuelan.

00:19:55.940 People make jokes.

00:19:56.600 I bring up every episode, right?

00:19:58.120 But the left's ignorance and unwillingness to address what is happening in Venezuela,

00:20:04.900 I find enraging, to be honest with you, because it's a humanitarian catastrophe.

00:20:10.800 Yet, Corbyn comes out,

00:20:13.720 says how brilliant Venezuela is in 2012.

00:20:16.020 Everybody should be like Venezuela. 1.00

00:20:17.640 Because they can't criticise their own side.

00:20:19.100 They can't admit when socialism goes wrong.

00:20:21.980 And I don't understand this.

00:20:23.900 This is why, I mean, I always get bracketed as right wing

00:20:26.780 because I critique the left so often.

00:20:28.920 But of course I critique the left

00:20:29.760 because I'm on the left and I want it to improve 0.98

00:20:31.760 and I want it to stop fucking up. 0.97

00:20:33.960 So that's why I do it. 0.97

00:20:35.060 But they brook no critique at all.

00:20:38.440 They're not having it.

00:20:38.880 So everyone everything's got to be perfect. This is because of the leftist mindset that believes in a utopian world

00:20:43.880 You know, that's what they but they believe they believe that if they can control language

00:20:47.480 If they control the words that you can say they will realize this utopia. It's not gonna happen

00:20:52.120 You're not gonna eliminate homophobia just by saying that people can't say pufta anymore

00:20:55.680 That's not how it works, but they think that they think you'll never eliminate it by the way

00:20:59.760 What you do is you just negotiate and you find ways through and you challenge it. That's what you do

00:21:04.380 But you don't it's to do with the mindset. That's why they won't criticize

00:21:08.200 That's why Corbyn's a saint.

00:21:09.980 That's why they've got their chant about him.

00:21:12.620 It's cultish.

00:21:13.820 Well, let me ask you, before I ask this question,

00:21:15.960 by the way, if you're wondering why Francis keeps mentioning

00:21:18.140 that he's from Venezuela,

00:21:19.660 it's because he wants you to send them food.

00:21:22.120 Just send food to his house.

00:21:24.100 And money.

00:21:24.780 And money. 1.00

00:21:25.980 No, just don't fuck the food. 1.00

00:21:27.620 Money. 1.00

00:21:28.000 Just send me money.

00:21:29.180 Not Venezuelan money, because that's worth it. 1.00

00:21:31.580 World of Warcraft money is actually worth more

00:21:33.240 than the Venezuelan currency.

00:21:34.120 Is it really?

00:21:34.640 It is indeed.

00:21:35.780 Wow.

00:21:36.180 Yeah. Okay. That is a crisis. Socialism. Yay. Socialism in action, everybody.

00:21:42.420 So here's the thing that I wanted to ask you, because when you talk about you criticise

00:21:47.620 identitarian left and you say you're on the left, and yet if I go on the internet and I put the

00:21:52.300 words Andrew Doyle, it would be right wing, reactionary, blah, blah, blah, right spike,

00:21:58.300 blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So when you say that you are on the left, right, what do you mean by

00:22:04.200 that okay so i'm glad you raised this because uh only yesterday somebody posted a thing on facebook

00:22:09.360 calling me a uh it was a podcast they called me far right extremist a far right extremist um a

00:22:15.220 friend of mine because i get because friends send me this stuff it's almost like they want me to

00:22:18.560 and he sent it to me and said listen to this it's really funny and it's you know what i listened to

00:22:22.720 the first time it's just a couple of kids right it's two kids they they're not they don't know

00:22:26.220 much about politics i was probably the same at their age you know i thought i knew everything

00:22:28.820 but actually didn't know anything and they're they're i turned off at the point where it's like

00:22:32.860 their critique of my politics is basically to read out the headlines of my articles and just

00:22:39.640 guess what they might be saying you know I get this all the time with Spiked you know I had an

00:22:43.520 argument on Twitter where someone was saying uh I can't believe you've written another right-wing

00:22:47.520 article and I said okay specifically what argument do you have issue with in that and he replied I

00:22:53.220 promise you he replied I haven't read it I'm not going to read an article in Spiked so it's like

00:22:59.160 Okay, what's the point? Most of the arguments I have with people online are

00:23:04.140 people who have just imagined what I believe, right? I can't do that.

00:23:08.800 I can't defend a position

00:23:10.100 I don't hold simply because you as my opponent imagine I hold that position and that's why I'm getting tired of it.

00:23:15.500 Like there's no point in me debating and trying to defend something

00:23:18.280 I don't believe. I can only defend what I actually believe. It's a futile debate.

00:23:21.120 So let's bring it back. When you talk about being left-wing, what does that mean?

00:23:26.460 OK, so if you were to write down my core beliefs, I suppose,

00:23:31.380 then you would ask, and you would try and define objectively what that is,

00:23:35.680 it would, I would say, be a leftist.

00:23:39.160 So I'll go through them if you want.

00:23:40.600 So I'm for democracy, I'm for equality, I'm for liberty, right?

00:23:46.420 Classic lefty always displaying virtues.

00:23:48.220 Right, OK. Yeah, there we go. 0.98

00:23:51.000 I'm really vain and arrogant.

00:23:52.200 I believe that democracy is an imperfect system, but it's the best that we can ever hope to get, right?

00:23:59.400 It's an imperfect world, right?

00:24:00.440 So that's why I am outraged at the idea that Parliament are effectively trying to thwart the referendum because it is anti-democratic.

00:24:08.340 So anyway, I'm for democracy.

00:24:10.500 I believe in the free market, but I also think that there should be a degree of wealth redistribution affected through proportionate taxation.

00:24:20.260 I think that's the way I see socialism in the sort of the Joseph Schumpeter conception of socialism as being a corrective to capitalism, as being like to curb the worst excesses of capitalism.

00:24:29.860 So by all means, you've got your ambition, you know, you can get richer, you know, all of that stuff.

00:24:34.440 But there comes a point where the distinction is so egregious.

00:24:38.160 You know, there are people with billions and billions and billions of pounds and they should be taxed more, I think.

00:24:41.900 So that to me, I think, is probably elected.

00:24:43.960 I'm probably somewhere between socialism, social liberalism.

00:24:46.340 I believe in the welfare state.

00:24:47.620 I believe in National Health Service.

00:24:49.500 I believe that we should be looking out for vulnerable people in our society and that the state should have a role within that.

00:24:54.640 I believe in standing up against bigotry, racism, homophobia, sexism, whatever, challenging all of that wherever possible.

00:24:59.840 I believe in freedom of speech. I believe in freedom of the press.

00:25:04.200 Are these things right wing?

00:25:08.320 Not to me. No. Right. So what's happened?

00:25:11.840 And I always say to people when they say, well, you're on the right. I'm also not anti I'm not nationalist.

00:25:16.000 I don't have a nationalist instinct in my body. I'm pro immigration.

00:25:19.500 I believe immigration is essential.

00:25:21.340 I'm still trying to, I'm still confused.

00:25:23.040 I've never voted Tory.

00:25:24.120 I voted for Jeremy Corbyn.

00:25:25.460 If I'm a far-right extremist, I'm doing a really bad job.

00:25:28.620 I'm the worst far-right extremist in the world.

00:25:30.420 But now, so whenever I say to people, tell me, tell me what I've said or what I believe

00:25:34.900 that is far-right or far-right wing.

00:25:37.440 And all they can come up with is what I know you secretly believe. 0.97

00:25:41.600 What you secretly believe is that you're a crypto fascist. 0.99

00:25:44.060 You know, you're a secret racist, you're a secret bigger, all this sort of stuff. 0.99

00:25:48.460 Well, that's not good enough. 0.98

00:25:49.320 This telepathy you have, your ability to intuit what I actually secretly think,

00:25:54.220 it's not good enough, right?

00:25:55.420 Because guess what?

00:25:56.140 I know my own mind better than you.

00:25:58.300 And I don't lie.

00:25:59.360 Well, I don't lie in my article.

00:26:02.560 I lie to get out of trouble with family and friends.

00:26:05.120 But in article, I'm not going to...

00:26:08.540 It's this bad faith interpretation that is really damaging political discourse.

00:26:12.860 If I write an article expressing my viewpoint and outlying why I think what I think,

00:26:17.420 I'm not being disingenuous.

00:26:18.280 That's what I think.

00:26:19.320 You know, it's so much easier for an opponent to say, yeah, they don't really think that, though.

00:26:24.020 You don't really think that, do you? You think something else.

00:26:25.960 So then it's a straw man. And that's the way the political discourse is going again and again.

00:26:30.980 And I find it hugely troubling. And this is why I'm really I always go on about it.

00:26:36.020 But I'm really insistent that I'm a former teacher.

00:26:39.140 I think education is key to our intellectual development as a nation.

00:26:42.840 And I think we need to restore critical thinking into the curriculum.

00:26:46.440 When I taught critical thinking at school,

00:26:47.980 it was like the DOS subject

00:26:49.660 and people weren't really taking it seriously.

00:26:51.260 And I think it's key.

00:26:52.820 I think first day, day one,

00:26:55.660 you tell them, you know,

00:26:56.300 if you insult the other person

00:26:57.580 or if you intuit their motive,

00:26:58.860 if you guess what you think,

00:26:59.720 you've lost the argument.

00:27:00.680 It's done. It's over. You've lost.

00:27:02.280 Right?

00:27:02.900 If you sling insults,

00:27:04.760 if you call someone a Nazi, right?

00:27:06.680 If you call someone a Nazi,

00:27:07.900 you better have some evidence for that.

00:27:08.840 That's an extraordinarily horrible thing

00:27:10.500 to call someone if they're not.

00:27:12.020 Right?

00:27:12.420 Reserve the term for people who are.

00:27:13.720 People like concerts

00:27:15.600 So I'm confused

00:27:18.900 and maybe you can help me here, maybe you can explain to me

00:27:21.160 how any of these principles I've outlined

00:27:22.880 are in any way right wing, if they are fine

00:27:24.300 but have the goalposts moved that much?

00:27:26.780 I'll tell you what is one thing

00:27:28.840 that people could attach to you

00:27:30.840 where you could perceive to be right wing

00:27:32.520 and it's the absolute ignorance of this

00:27:35.040 it's being pro-Brexit 0.93

00:27:37.240 and that to certain

00:27:39.000 people they will go, well he's obviously

00:27:40.860 against immigration, he hates foreigners

00:27:43.480 Therefore, he is right-wing, a.k.a. Nazi. 0.95

00:27:46.580 Yeah, because people bought into this narrative

00:27:48.380 that the Brexit vote was basically a yes-no-are-you-racist vote.

00:27:52.700 They bought into this idea,

00:27:55.960 which was irresponsibly perpetuated by the media.

00:27:59.860 And you had this thing where, you know...

00:28:01.740 You know, after the Brexit vote, then you had this...

00:28:04.640 There were more hate crimes were reported, 1.00

00:28:07.160 and even friends of mine said they'd heard some idiots 1.00

00:28:10.600 in comedy clubs shouting out these overtly bigoted things 1.00

00:28:12.840 and they connected this that people have bought into this fantasy that we live in a really bigoted

00:28:17.480 country we don't we live in one of the most tolerant countries in the world right there 1.00

00:28:20.520 have always been a small minority of absolute scum idiots racists or the rest of it and maybe 1.00

00:28:26.440 it's true that a few of them felt emboldened after the vote but the reason for that will be that when 1.00

00:28:30.200 you have the media for six months pushing the idea that there are 16 so 17.4 million racists in the

00:28:36.040 country suddenly you feel validated right there aren't though there just aren't but but that if

00:28:41.160 If people have been emboldened, that's why.

00:28:43.500 It's not because there were 17.4 million racists, right?

00:28:46.840 We know from the Ashcroft polls after the Brexit vote that the top reason that people

00:28:50.100 voted for Brexit was the principle of sovereignty, that the laws that govern our country should

00:28:53.760 be made in our country, OK?

00:28:56.240 Immigration was important.

00:28:57.240 But ever since—we haven't been able to have a sensible discussion about immigration

00:29:00.980 since Enoch Powell's Rivers of Blood speech, and one of the major—I mean, it was so wrongheaded

00:29:05.740 in many ways, but one of the major—the legacy of that is we haven't been able to have a

00:29:08.760 conversation about it.

00:29:09.900 So we now have this assumption that if you have legitimate concerns about immigration,

00:29:14.060 you're a racist. 0.92

00:29:15.320 And people jump to that and they throw that word out there. 0.96

00:29:18.720 The other reason with Brexit, I mean, I cannot reconcile being on the left and being a socialist

00:29:23.740 with voting in favour of this massive pro-corporate, bureaucratic, undemocratic bloc that has

00:29:30.220 a big business, relentlessly lobbying in order to have extra regulations, more regulations.

00:29:38.180 And the reason for that being that it pushes out the smaller businesses who can't compete.

00:29:41.960 We only learnt about their negotiations over TTIP because it was leaked, right?

00:29:46.840 Because everything is backdoor with them and they're unaccountable, right?

00:29:50.860 We can't vote those people out in the European Commission.

00:29:53.340 We can't do it.

00:29:54.140 There was a really good article on the BBC about the extent to which laws and regulations in this country come from Brussels, right?

00:29:59.820 Because people say it's a myth.

00:30:00.840 What are these laws?

00:30:01.740 What are these laws that are not invented here?

00:30:04.140 Well, the BBC did a really interesting study and it's really difficult to pinpoint.

00:30:06.940 But it's anywhere between 11 and 63 percent of our laws. So let's go down the middle.

00:30:11.100 Let's say it's like 35 percent of our laws and regulations originate in Brussels.

00:30:14.420 That's not a democratic system, is it? Particularly if you can't vote them out.

00:30:18.120 So I cannot understand, you know, if you think about the major players in Brussels,

00:30:23.700 so you've got Junker, Barnier, Verhofstadt, you know, Tusk.

00:30:28.120 These are all centre-right politicians.

00:30:30.920 When you've got leftists, supposed socialists in our country, cheering on these people,

00:30:34.740 saying that these are the bastions of freedom,

00:30:37.200 that's like cheering on Cameron or cheering on Thatcher.

00:30:40.880 It doesn't make any sense.

00:30:42.620 You know, why do we not...

00:30:43.500 You know, Cameron pushed this.

00:30:45.060 Cameron was the one who wanted us to remain in the...

00:30:47.000 This is a...

00:30:48.040 Let's call it what it is.

00:30:49.660 The EU is a right-wing establishment,

00:30:52.460 right-wing pro-corporate establishment.

00:30:53.920 And if you're happy voting for that, good for you.

00:30:56.180 But I do not know how you can call yourself left-wing by doing so.

00:31:00.100 But it's also...

00:31:01.260 It goes back and it touches back when we go to education

00:31:04.260 and to me, it's an intellectual laziness.

00:31:06.920 Yeah, absolutely.

00:31:07.860 Because, and we see it with the podcast,

00:31:09.560 people go to me, oh, your podcast is right wing.

00:31:11.880 I go, have you listened to it?

00:31:12.880 No.

00:31:13.380 No, no, exactly.

00:31:14.260 People don't know what right and left wing means anymore.

00:31:16.280 Yeah.

00:31:16.500 That's the problem.

00:31:17.360 It's just an insult, I think.

00:31:18.380 It doesn't mean any, yeah, exactly.

00:31:19.940 I think this is where we come back

00:31:21.600 to the power of woke culture.

00:31:23.360 What they have successfully done

00:31:24.720 is to convince people that to be on the left

00:31:27.560 means that you are basically using the right words

00:31:30.360 and a pro, you know, and diversity

00:31:32.340 and all that sort of stuff.

00:31:33.220 And to be on the right, you're raising concerns about immigration or you're saying, no, I'm not going to use new gender pronouns or whatever.

00:31:39.920 That's not right and left. OK.

00:31:42.560 And that's I think that's the problem is that they've successfully changed the meaning of right and left.

00:31:47.320 And that's why you can suddenly call me right wing, even though my values don't seem to match that description.

00:31:54.440 Let me ask you this. I hope you don't mind me asking.

00:31:56.080 We had you on the show. You were one of our first guests.

00:31:58.600 And we were very happy to have you on.

00:32:00.640 and I remember you were

00:32:02.700 how can I put it

00:32:04.500 you were less on edge then

00:32:05.900 than you are now

00:32:06.740 do I seem more on edge?

00:32:07.880 yes you do

00:32:08.620 wow

00:32:09.060 and I wonder whether

00:32:10.740 you're feeling the pressure

00:32:12.400 of people coming after you

00:32:14.260 with Jonathan Pye

00:32:15.280 and everything you're doing there

00:32:16.460 and at least you're having people

00:32:18.060 attack you more

00:32:18.800 and therefore you feel like

00:32:19.540 you have to defend yourself more

00:32:20.660 yeah probably

00:32:21.080 I think

00:32:21.880 I'm not as active on Twitter

00:32:24.260 as I used to be

00:32:25.140 because most times I go on

00:32:26.660 I'm getting someone

00:32:27.440 calling me a Nazi

00:32:28.220 or alt-right 0.62

00:32:28.740 or some nonsense like that

00:32:30.320 And it's so far off.

00:32:33.240 I mean, you know, I'm not just not a Nazi.

00:32:35.860 I'm anti that.

00:32:37.520 I oppose that with every fiber of my being.

00:32:40.260 So it's bizarre that you get called that.

00:32:43.240 You know, it's really weird.

00:32:44.700 Largely, they say it's because of Spiked,

00:32:46.220 and they say Spiked is an alt-right site.

00:32:48.480 Alt-right means white nationalist.

00:32:50.140 That's what it means.

00:32:51.440 You will never find a racist statement on a spiked article

00:32:54.700 because just editorially, they wouldn't have it.

00:32:56.540 It's not a racist, it's an anti-racist.

00:32:58.320 Also, by the way, of all the publications, Spiked has been the one that has been most vocally opposed, has opposed the alt-right more than anyone else, more consistently than anyone else, has consistently opposed Donald Trump, has no time for this.

00:33:11.740 So this is the problem, is the misrepresentation.

00:33:15.100 And it's people who don't read.

00:33:16.560 They don't read the things they're criticising.

00:33:18.080 So let's talk about that.

00:33:19.400 So just to say, if I see Mon Edge and everything, maybe it's just that this week I've had a lot of this.

00:33:25.820 a lot. These people calling me far-right extremists and stuff. A very close friend of mine shouting

00:33:30.560 at me, calling me a Nazi in a public place. And you just think, you know, at what point?

00:33:36.420 I mean, do you really believe that about me? Do you really believe I'm that evil? That's

00:33:41.540 quite upsetting. It's distressing. I agree. So this is what I was going to ask to come

00:33:46.680 back to an issue of principle. And we talked the first time you were here. And then we

00:33:50.060 talked to brendan o'neill who who's the editor spiked about the restrictions around libel and

00:33:56.980 smearing people and things like that and you know brendan said oh i'm absolutist we don't need libel

00:34:02.160 laws we don't need this and you know after someone like with you and with me people calling you a

00:34:06.520 nazi because you you refuse to sign a behavioral agreement contract or whatever you kind of go

00:34:10.420 yeah maybe we do need some libel laws do you know what i mean yeah yeah i mean i don't know where i

00:34:14.020 fully stand on the line i think we do i think i think libel laws make some sort of sense to me

00:34:18.720 because, of course, if you are saying something

00:34:20.900 that is factually wrong about someone

00:34:22.300 in order to damage their career,

00:34:24.640 or maybe what it should be

00:34:26.100 is that you pursue that through civil means

00:34:27.880 and that it's a legal issue in that way.

00:34:29.980 You take out a civil lawsuit

00:34:30.940 rather than get the state involved.

00:34:32.920 To be honest, I don't know where I stand on that entirely.

00:34:34.660 I need to give it more thought

00:34:35.640 before I come up with what I think.

00:34:37.140 But I would say, yeah,

00:34:38.640 people who are calling me far-right extremists,

00:34:40.620 they're lucky I'm not litigious, you know, 1.00

00:34:43.080 because they'd have to demonstrate that

00:34:44.480 and they won't be able to because it's not true.

00:34:47.300 But it's also as well the rise of social media

00:34:49.940 where everybody has access to a voice,

00:34:51.740 everybody can post whatever it is that they want.

00:34:54.120 Whereas before, you know, I mean,

00:34:55.980 the closest that we had to criticising people

00:34:59.420 was points of view.

00:35:00.860 Yeah, with Anne Robinson.

00:35:02.340 Yeah, absolutely.

00:35:03.480 I mean, which was a great programme.

00:35:04.780 I loved it, yeah.

00:35:05.900 Bring it back.

00:35:06.680 Yeah.

00:35:07.240 I mean, you know, you had to write your letter,

00:35:09.260 you had to post it,

00:35:10.200 you had to wait to see if you made it through.

00:35:12.180 Whereas now, you just go online, bam, Nazi, there you go. 0.75

00:35:15.000 Yeah.

00:35:15.480 Yeah, it's sad, isn't it?

00:35:16.560 But then there's a lot of good things about social media as well.

00:35:19.420 I mean, I wish I could get off it in a way.

00:35:22.380 I'm not... I sort of rely on it for work, you know.

00:35:25.240 So much of my job is on the internet now, so that's just the way it is.

00:35:29.720 But yeah, you're absolutely right.

00:35:31.640 People have always had these views and have always had these limited understandings of politics

00:35:36.480 and been very opinionated.

00:35:38.640 It's amazing when people are opinionated but they don't know what they're talking about.

00:35:41.360 That's what you're seeing when you see this online.

00:35:43.320 and this inability to listen

00:35:46.920 or to even accept that they might be wrong about something.

00:35:50.300 Because it becomes about an ego thing, doesn't it?

00:35:52.000 When you're online and you're having an argument with someone,

00:35:54.040 there's an awareness that everyone can watch it.

00:35:56.080 And then it becomes about scoring points.

00:35:57.940 It's about locking horns.

00:35:59.240 It's a very primal thing.

00:36:01.080 You don't want to be shown up.

00:36:01.980 You don't want to lose the argument.

00:36:02.740 You don't want to at any point say,

00:36:05.060 oh, actually, you might have a point about that

00:36:06.360 because that's perceived as weakness

00:36:07.720 and you might look like the weaker party in that fight.

00:36:11.580 and that's why sometimes online

00:36:15.020 when people are really wanting, picking a fight

00:36:17.840 I'll say, look, let's DM, let's do this over

00:36:20.540 because then the ego, because I would be at risk as well

00:36:23.200 you know, I'm not bereft of an ego

00:36:25.580 I am aware that in those kind of public forums

00:36:29.540 even in a debate format

00:36:31.500 I'm aware that I'm also trying to protect my ego

00:36:33.700 and that's not helpful for debate

00:36:34.900 and you've got to be aware of it and you've got to counter it

00:36:37.080 and I don't think online, that's why online debates are useless

00:36:40.820 Yeah, but also television debates seem useless.

00:36:42.740 Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.

00:36:43.600 Because I find question time unwatchable.

00:36:45.880 A lot of them, it just descends into shouting.

00:36:47.880 Well, I mean, I did a show two days ago,

00:36:51.180 Ian Dale's show on LBC.

00:36:52.340 Yeah, I've been on that as well, yeah.

00:36:53.300 Yeah, and it's called Cross Question.

00:36:54.880 And what was great, so there was me, Giles Fraser,

00:36:58.360 Tom, oh, I should know his name, Tom,

00:37:00.800 Conservative MP, oh, it's terrible,

00:37:02.360 he's really nice as well,

00:37:03.840 and James, and I can't remember his surname either,

00:37:06.680 but he was part of the People's Vote.

00:37:08.960 What was lovely, though,

00:37:09.740 There was a really nice bunch on that panel.

00:37:11.200 I mean, I couldn't disagree with James more about the Brexit vote.

00:37:14.560 And Tom believes in pushing through Theresa May's Chequers deal, which I don't.

00:37:19.200 And, you know, we all had different views.

00:37:21.660 We went out for a drink afterwards.

00:37:22.480 It was really great.

00:37:23.240 And we were able to talk about this stuff without anyone getting insulted and getting on.

00:37:27.520 And it was really refreshing.

00:37:28.660 It's like this is what it should be.

00:37:30.860 You know, I can say I'm pro-Brexit without someone just calling me a racist.

00:37:34.380 Brilliant.

00:37:34.860 That's a real step forward.

00:37:36.020 and I would love that to be the case

00:37:38.840 that we could have that

00:37:40.440 or restore that to political discourse generally

00:37:42.780 but we can't

00:37:44.240 while people are slaves

00:37:47.120 to this cultish world view

00:37:48.640 and while they are buying into the fantasy

00:37:51.040 of the rise of

00:37:52.720 neo-Nazism within Britain

00:37:54.480 and they think that

00:37:56.820 Nazis are everywhere

00:37:57.900 and they just assume that you have these malevolent intentions

00:38:01.000 we won't be able to

00:38:02.620 that's why the culture war is actually really important

00:38:04.580 because we can't make any other gains politically, socially, economically

00:38:08.360 until this stuff is sorted out

00:38:10.100 because no one's listening to each other anymore.

00:38:11.600 They're just insulting each other.

00:38:12.700 It comes to a point where, to me, a debate is where two people discuss something

00:38:16.700 and then they go away and they'll have a think about it.

00:38:19.760 Yeah.

00:38:20.300 That's what it should be.

00:38:21.440 Or to be open to the possibility that you're wrong.

00:38:24.840 Yeah.

00:38:25.240 Right?

00:38:25.860 And this thing about, you know,

00:38:28.960 I mean, I'd say my core principles have always been consistent,

00:38:31.460 but my views on various things have been refined and nuanced and changed on the basis of talking

00:38:37.700 to people and hearing other views right and that's all that's how it should be if you if you go into

00:38:42.160 an argument with the belief that your opponent is evil you know it is is it has a really dark

00:38:50.820 sinister evil agenda secret agenda some clandestine machiavellian uh worldview what what can you learn

00:38:58.380 from that person nothing because you've already put up the the brick wall nothing's going to

00:39:02.900 happen and and and and your your views will become more entrenched and that's where you get that's

00:39:08.960 where you get this cultish mindset it just reminds you of George W Bush when he said if God is on our

00:39:14.240 side how can we be wrong yeah yeah it is it's religious I'm always very wary of the irrational 0.56

00:39:21.940 you know um and i'm wary of it in myself as well you know that we all have that capacity

00:39:27.380 and i that's why i think it's about education i think once we once we restore that in schools

00:39:33.400 then then things will slowly change but it's going to take a while i think it'll get worse

00:39:37.140 before it gets better i think also the understanding of the importance of truth

00:39:41.940 yeah over feelings and over mood and over whatever the the the social the socially acceptable thing

00:39:50.300 to think and to know is important because you know like for growing up in the Soviet Union

00:39:55.900 I grew up in a society which was maintained yeah by not allowing people to speak the truth

00:40:02.280 because the system was so flawed it was so corrupt it was so unfounded in the way that it was designed

00:40:09.320 that one person speaking the truth about it in public was enough to collapse it yeah right and

00:40:14.760 What I sense with this woke ideology and the institutions that they've created is they have to suppress the truth or they feel like they have to suppress the truth because someone telling the truth in public about their system and about their way of thinking would collapse the system because it doesn't make sense.

00:40:33.860 yeah it's not logically sound it's not coherent and it's not based on the fact whether it's the

00:40:39.000 gender pay gap whether it's is institutional racism all of the stuff that the narrative is

00:40:44.820 one thing and the truth is something completely different they can't afford to uh to surrender

00:40:50.400 that high ground can they i mean the gender pay gap is a good example when we did a video about 0.92

00:40:54.280 it for jonathan pye and so many angry critiques of that but nobody actually engaging with any of

00:41:00.660 arguments that never happened you know and and that's um it's a shame you know because i'd be

00:41:05.280 willing to have that debate well since we had you on and you talked about that we've had dozens of

00:41:09.800 economists and other experts come and basically explain that it's like 90 nothing to do with

00:41:15.420 discrimination it's about people's choices it's about the careers they choose but those are facts

00:41:19.900 yeah you see this is a brand and if the facts are inconvenient then the the tendency seems to be to

00:41:25.140 just avoid them or not debate them or just dismiss the opponents, you know.

00:41:29.580 I mean, because the ideology, the woke ideology, is self-discrediting.

00:41:35.340 It is internally incoherent, you know. If you say that gender is a social

00:41:40.560 construct, except for trans people who are born with a male brain or female

00:41:44.800 brain, that's a biological essentialist position, right. So you can't have both.

00:41:49.200 you can't have both so there's there is this this problem that as an ideology it

00:41:55.260 is messed up it doesn't work and it will collapse but it just depends when it's

00:41:59.160 going to collapse and it and that's why they're they're putting up all these

00:42:02.580 barricades and that's why they attack people so vehemently that's why they

00:42:05.520 push for censorship that's why they oppose free speech because they know

00:42:08.960 that with speech debate and discussion bad ideas fall yeah and they're but

00:42:14.280 they're bad I they've got one of the worst ideas in the world that will that

00:42:17.400 will crumble under scrutiny so they have to suppress the debate well the only people who

00:42:21.720 fear truth are people who are peddling lies yeah well it's either lies uh which i suspect might be

00:42:26.740 the case with some people but i also think people do genuinely believe it in the way that you know

00:42:31.420 the the people who worship baal or whatever believe in that you know they they they do yeah

00:42:36.920 i don't think it's insincere in a lot of the cases i'm not saying it's insincere i'm saying

00:42:40.780 they've bought a lie they've bought a lie yeah they have yeah and um so i don't know how we do

00:42:46.720 it i don't know how we move beyond it uh other than keep keep challenging as far as you can

00:42:52.140 and accept that those in power will try and stop you if you were going to make predictions i know

00:42:57.820 it's always difficult to make predictions but why not we're at this this is yeah i always get it

00:43:01.840 wrong when i guess you know you know this we're at the very beginning of january it's 2019 yeah

00:43:08.220 where do you think this is going to go over the coming year so i think every new year i think oh

00:43:14.380 well there's been so many ridiculous stories in the present so much you know this isn't political

00:43:19.560 correctness by the way that I think one of the reasons why we're not advancing this debate and 1.00

00:43:22.720 why they keep doubling down is because of course back in the 90s right you had these stupid bullshit 0.99

00:43:27.300 stories like Winterville oh you know they're trying to ban Christmas now uh which wasn't the 0.99

00:43:32.480 case it was Birmingham City Council who had come up with this phrase Winterville to encapsulate

00:43:35.960 all the various festive uh traditions right that no one's trying to ban Christmas or saying

00:43:40.620 but that's the way it was reported by reactionary right-wing tabloids then you had the bar bar

00:43:44.860 rainbow sheep you remember that one that was front page of the express you're no longer allowed to

00:43:48.260 say black in nursery schools this nursery school's doing all it was was that this nursery teacher was

00:43:53.220 teaching kids about the colors of the rainbow and had changed the song in order to do so it was

00:43:56.680 nothing to do with right so therefore you had all this stuff and all these awful people say oh

00:44:00.500 political correctness has gone mad and you had all this kind of reactionary you know kind of

00:44:04.800 Richard Littlejohn thing, right? And that's why when we point out that things are going too far

00:44:11.580 now, the common response is, oh, you're just part of this PC gone mad brigade. They are comparing

00:44:17.640 us to Richard Littlejohn. This is not political correctness. This is something far more sinister.

00:44:23.520 Political correctness is a good idea. Political correctness is about the social discourse,

00:44:28.080 negotiating the social discourse and trying to have a mutually agreed way that we talk to each

00:44:32.780 other in public. Politeness, etiquette, that's what it is, which I'm all for, right? I'm

00:44:37.340 not all for locking people away for what they say if they breach those terms, but I think

00:44:41.580 we do have a social contract, don't we? But that's not what's going on now. This isn't

00:44:46.320 political correctness. I don't use that term, but you'll know if you read my articles, I

00:44:49.920 don't attack political correctness because I don't see this woke movement as political

00:44:54.620 correctness. And that's the problem. That's why things aren't changing, because in the

00:44:58.580 mindset of the woke community. We are just the Richard Littlejohns. We're the same, it's the same

00:45:03.220 fight. It's not. It's a whole new battle and we need a new language for it. And actually in that

00:45:08.580 sense I'd rather like the anti-authoritarians on my side to stop using that phrase political

00:45:14.900 correctness because I think it muddies the waters, it's unhelpful. So I think in terms of the

00:45:18.900 prediction, until we find the new lexicon to deal with this phenomenon, whatever it is, whatever we

00:45:25.140 we want to call it, this new dogmatism, political dogmatism maybe, I don't know, then we'll

00:45:31.660 get nowhere and people will keep doubling down and they'll keep using every strategy

00:45:36.760 they can to push this ideology and I think it'll get a lot worse. But because, like you

00:45:42.940 say, most people recognise this for the bullshit that it is, most normal people, it won't survive. 0.99

00:45:49.740 Ultimately it won't survive, but it'll take a hell of a long time, I think. 0.99

00:45:51.620 I don't know. I don't know about that. I think you're being pessimistic, honestly.

00:45:54.600 Like, you have some jokes where you talk about the fact that,

00:45:58.560 if you don't mind me quoting one of your jokes.

00:46:00.440 You'll mess it up, won't you?

00:46:01.320 Yeah, I would definitely.

00:46:03.400 Talk about the timing.

00:46:04.360 But then if you tell the joke, it will look even worse.

00:46:06.760 Especially in this form.

00:46:07.640 Yeah, exactly.

00:46:08.620 If I do it, I'll nail it.

00:46:10.520 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:46:11.260 And what was the joke?

00:46:12.280 It's the joke about how the term Nazi has a very specific meaning.

00:46:16.640 And you talk about it's Combat 18, it's whatever.

00:46:19.940 It's Mumsnet is the punchline, right?

00:46:21.580 Oh, yeah, okay.

00:46:22.080 So while my situation was happening with this behavioral agreement contract,

00:46:26.280 a friend of mine went on the Mumsnet Radical Feminist Forum.

00:46:30.220 That's already funny.

00:46:31.280 Right.

00:46:31.700 And sent me a screenshot of what they were discussing.

00:46:35.440 Yeah.

00:46:35.740 And the radical feminists on Mumsnet were all on my side. 1.00

00:46:39.880 Right.

00:46:40.280 Okay.

00:46:40.620 There you go.

00:46:41.900 So if they're on our side, then I really, my sense is there's a sliver of this woke mentality somewhere

00:46:50.380 that's got power.

00:46:51.460 but the rest of society is just waiting for people like us to stand up and overturn it

00:46:56.420 maybe i wouldn't use mumsnet as a gauge for the future

00:46:59.540 maybe yeah i mean people you know most people and people this is the other thing like so many i mean

00:47:07.180 the thing about the comedy establishment is they've all got they they're thinking in terms

00:47:10.660 of careers and i get that right so that so they are on board with the woke thing because that's

00:47:14.100 the way the establishment's pushing it but you know when you talk to comics in private oh yeah

00:47:17.860 they'll all tell you

00:47:18.540 they know it

00:47:19.940 most of them do anyway

00:47:21.140 but they do it when they're a bit drunk

00:47:23.240 or they're confiding in you

00:47:24.380 they wouldn't tweet about it

00:47:26.940 in the way that I do

00:47:27.620 and part of the reason I do

00:47:31.120 is because I don't feel like

00:47:32.800 I've got anything to lose

00:47:33.480 in that score anymore

00:47:34.100 I was never going to be televisual

00:47:36.060 so I just sort of say what I think now

00:47:38.820 and also I think it's more

00:47:39.600 it's really liberating isn't it

00:47:41.480 just to be honest

00:47:42.040 I really feel for all those people

00:47:45.820 who do sort of have these opinions

00:47:47.940 like the people who do oppose

00:47:49.520 this creeping authoritarianism

00:47:51.040 and they want to say more about it

00:47:52.780 but they know that if they do

00:47:53.900 they're scuffering their chances

00:47:55.680 of a lucrative career.

00:47:56.920 I get that.

00:47:57.660 You know, it's difficult.

00:47:59.840 But surely isn't that the antithesis

00:48:01.160 of what comedy should be?

00:48:02.620 You think about the great comedians

00:48:04.140 they're the ones who call out

00:48:05.840 what they perceive to be

00:48:06.880 the inaccuracies of falsehoods in society.

00:48:09.900 They're the ones we fall in love with.

00:48:11.480 They're the ones that we quote endlessly.

00:48:13.520 There's a reason why people love Bill Hicks.

00:48:15.560 Yeah, yeah.

00:48:16.620 But, I mean, he wouldn't do so well today, would he?

00:48:18.340 Oh, no.

00:48:20.280 You know?

00:48:21.640 Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

00:48:22.980 I think, so I'm more optimistic than you are,

00:48:25.740 but you're right, it's liberating.

00:48:26.880 I mean, last time we talked,

00:48:28.180 I remember you saying you'd come to a point in your career

00:48:30.260 and you just said,

00:48:31.020 I'm not going to be mealy-mouthed about what I think.

00:48:34.020 Yeah.

00:48:34.300 And it's been, what, eight, nine months,

00:48:36.340 and now I'm in that position.

00:48:37.840 I've come to that point as well.

00:48:39.300 With this contract, I was kind of forced into it.

00:48:41.480 Yeah, yeah, they forced your hand, didn't they?

00:48:42.560 They forced my hand.

00:48:43.340 Yeah.

00:48:43.820 Because it went viral without any intention on my part.

00:48:47.600 Yeah.

00:48:47.880 But once it happened...

00:48:49.060 Oh, but then they'll say that you were...

00:48:50.520 Well, I know, I saw the accusation.

00:48:51.560 Yeah, yeah.

00:48:51.880 You'd cynically manipulated this.

00:48:53.340 Yeah, yeah, of course.

00:48:54.040 It's that thing of they can't bear the idea

00:48:56.500 that someone has sincerely held beliefs

00:48:58.000 that don't match their own.

00:48:59.240 Yeah.

00:48:59.540 What an odd idea.

00:49:01.920 Yeah.

00:49:02.380 And the funny thing to me is they just...

00:49:04.200 They think that publicity is generated

00:49:07.720 by you, like, calling up a newspaper and going,

00:49:10.900 hey, I've got this opinion, put me on TV.

00:49:13.360 and it's like if I could do that

00:49:16.160 do you not think I would be doing that every day

00:49:18.440 I'd be having a viral story

00:49:20.260 out there every single day for the rest of my life

00:49:22.440 and what they don't seem to get is

00:49:24.300 this story with me

00:49:26.360 had nothing to do with comedy

00:49:27.480 the reason it went viral is that

00:49:29.940 95% of the population look at it and go

00:49:32.560 I am censoring

00:49:34.660 myself in my own life

00:49:36.260 and I see comedy

00:49:38.260 as just a way of reflecting my own experience

00:49:40.780 and I think that's why

00:49:42.600 I think this is going to be, well, we'll see a year from now.

00:49:45.900 We'll have you back a year from now.

00:49:46.600 Shall we come back next year?

00:49:47.420 And you'll be like, I told you it was going to be Cher Constantin,

00:49:49.440 and I'll be like, yeah, I know.

00:49:50.500 We'll have a new studio.

00:49:52.120 We'll be somewhere else.

00:49:54.140 We would have been kicked out of this one by then.

00:49:56.800 It might be all great.

00:49:57.700 It might be all rosy next year.

00:49:58.800 Who knows?

00:49:59.280 Well, that's my sense of it, man.

00:50:00.680 I genuinely think with what you're doing with Comedy Unleashed,

00:50:03.400 having played it, what, two or three times now,

00:50:05.300 and Francis will be there,

00:50:07.100 and you've got a bunch of other great comedians coming.

00:50:09.300 I just sense that the tide's turning.

00:50:12.460 Yeah, yeah, maybe.

00:50:14.280 I mean, I know the clip of you reading out

00:50:16.680 the behavioural agreement form at Comedy Unleashed was online

00:50:19.380 and you hear people jeering at the idea of it.

00:50:22.760 And I've seen that in the press being misinterpreted as,

00:50:25.360 oh, these people are jeering at the idea of being nice to people.

00:50:28.680 No, they're not.

00:50:29.580 And you must know they're not.

00:50:32.560 But they're jeering at the concept of trying to police comedy.

00:50:35.200 And, you know, that's what the joke is.

00:50:37.120 But if you're going to willfully misinterpret that

00:50:39.700 to make a political point,

00:50:40.680 then that's what we're fighting against, really.

00:50:42.940 In fact, I should urge the people to watch that clip.

00:50:45.460 I think it's really interesting.

00:50:46.680 What it isn't, though, is a group of racists saying,

00:50:48.360 oh, my God, why can't we be racist anymore?

00:50:50.080 You had that accusation, didn't you,

00:50:51.280 that you obviously want the right to stand up on stage?

00:50:54.420 I don't talk about the person who wrote that story

00:50:56.500 just because I don't want to give them any more publicity

00:50:58.220 than they shouldn't get in the first place.

00:51:00.660 But the point I'm making to you is,

00:51:03.560 yeah, there were people who came after me,

00:51:05.740 almost exclusively comedians, actually.

00:51:08.260 Fascinating, isn't it?

00:51:08.980 Almost exclusively comedians.

00:51:10.680 It's almost like they just did it

00:51:12.200 in order to bring attention to themselves

00:51:13.660 and further their careers.

00:51:14.620 Now, stop intuiting Motu.

00:51:16.680 You really mustn't do that.

00:51:17.500 That's entirely unlike comedians,

00:51:19.240 so that would never have happened.

00:51:20.920 But like I say, I just felt like

00:51:23.140 the support from ordinary people

00:51:24.860 for what happened was so strong

00:51:27.380 that I feel like it's just...

00:51:30.980 Ordinary people are just waiting 1.00

00:51:32.660 for someone to stand up

00:51:33.680 and stick their head above the parapet.

00:51:34.780 There's such a disconnect, isn't there,

00:51:36.000 between the people with the power

00:51:38.740 and the normal people,

00:51:40.160 And that goes for comedy, goes for politics. Right. I mean, at the moment, we have got our parliament trying to completely thwart the wishes of the electorate.

00:51:48.440 This is insane. You know, and they're doing it with these seriously Orwellian terms like people's vote.

00:51:55.000 Like we are doing this to be more democratic. We want more democracy. So we're going to ignore your referendum. Right.

00:52:00.740 What is going on? I mean, this is they don't understand how damaging this is going to be to democracy.

00:52:05.280 I mean, I don't think Brexit will happen now.

00:52:07.700 And I think there's a complete naivety amongst the political class when it comes to this issue.

00:52:15.440 The public won't forgive this.

00:52:17.340 This is incredible, you know.

00:52:19.220 Parliamentary democracy is a good system, right?

00:52:21.860 It's there as a kind of conduit so that we can make things happen, right,

00:52:26.860 so that the people can make things happen and make their wishes be served in a political context, right?

00:52:31.820 what parliamentary democracy isn't

00:52:33.880 is we vote someone in so that they can ignore

00:52:36.160 what we want and that's

00:52:38.180 what's happening right so

00:52:39.600 I don't know I think the legacy

00:52:42.200 of this Brexit issue

00:52:43.940 is going to be a big deal

00:52:45.440 I tried to end the show on a positive 0.99

00:52:48.080 Andrew's fucked it 0.99

00:52:50.180 Andrew's fucked it very hard so why don't 0.99

00:52:52.320 we do the last question because we're out of time 0.92

00:52:53.580 well we are out of time well the last question is

00:52:56.080 what's the one thing that we're not talking

00:52:58.300 about that we should talk about

00:52:59.980 But I think you sort of touched upon it with the Brexit.

00:53:03.140 Yeah, I think so.

00:53:03.940 Yeah, and what...

00:53:05.260 I'm sorry it's serious. 0.99

00:53:05.980 They're both fucking doing it. 0.99

00:53:07.380 I know. 1.00

00:53:07.740 I was trying to be positive.

00:53:08.640 It's the first episode of Trigonometry Season 2.

00:53:11.600 I could do some Brexit jokes.

00:53:13.060 I could make light of it. 1.00

00:53:14.280 We're all fucked. 1.00

00:53:15.040 Ha-ha! 1.00

00:53:15.880 But what do you think?

00:53:16.920 Let's...

00:53:17.920 Again, dangerous predictions.

00:53:19.700 Right, OK.

00:53:20.120 What do you think, if we don't go through with it,

00:53:23.620 if we don't honour the agreement,

00:53:26.420 what do you think is going to happen?

00:53:28.120 Where do we go?

00:53:28.580 let's try and be light though

00:53:29.960 let's try and be light

00:53:30.700 okay

00:53:31.000 the funny side of this

00:53:32.460 is that it is essentially funny

00:53:33.960 that our democratic representatives

00:53:35.840 hate democracy

00:53:37.060 that's funny

00:53:37.640 that's really funny

00:53:38.760 yeah that is funny

00:53:39.980 and we know that

00:53:40.940 look the EU has a record

00:53:41.960 they put out these referendums

00:53:43.800 right

00:53:43.980 and then they just say

00:53:44.700 nah you got the wrong answer

00:53:45.520 let's do it again

00:53:46.100 and they did that with Ireland

00:53:47.380 and the Nice

00:53:48.760 and Lisbon

00:53:49.800 Denmark and the Maastricht Treaty

00:53:51.420 and the Greece

00:53:52.060 and the austerity measures

00:53:52.940 nah we'll have the referendum

00:53:54.420 we'll put on the show

00:53:55.520 that you know

00:53:56.100 you can have your opinion

00:53:57.600 little people you know we'll have the plebiscite and then we'll just we'll screw you over because 1.00

00:54:02.180 we know better we know best working classes they need to just stick to their place right and there 1.00

00:54:06.560 is something quite hilarious about that i also love the amnesia about oh it was just an advisory

00:54:11.500 referendum this is hilarious stuff right um nobody knew they were voting to leave the single market

00:54:16.700 right but what is so funny about this is there's a thing called the internet and you and you can go

00:54:21.560 back and you can look at every major debate in which it was absolutely explicitly clear that we

00:54:25.880 were going to leave the single market. You know, the Wembley Arena, the biggest televised debate

00:54:29.600 with David Dimbleby, the first section of that, right, on the economy, there was a video outlying

00:54:35.160 what are the repercussions of leaving the single market. And it's there on YouTube. Takes you two

00:54:39.100 minutes, mate. Right. It's this incredible thing. No one knew what they were voting for. No one knew.

00:54:43.800 They voted because of something on the side of a bus. Are you kidding me? Do you think people are

00:54:48.360 that stupid? They voted because they saw something on a bus. A bus told me how to vote. What are you 1.00

00:54:52.740 You may as well say that people voted Remain because Cameron said that ISIS would vote leave, right?

00:54:59.320 Which he did.

00:55:00.240 He said, and he said it was going to, Brexit would kick off World War III. 0.99

00:55:03.780 This is funny shit. 0.99

00:55:05.720 ISIS would vote leave. 1.00

00:55:07.300 Yes, we said.

00:55:08.180 Do you reckon ISIS believes in democracy?

00:55:09.800 Yeah.

00:55:10.400 I mean, it is essentially funny, right?

00:55:13.560 And we have to acknowledge that.

00:55:16.140 The idea that people didn't know, the idea that people didn't know about the single market, that's great.

00:55:19.740 Everyone said it.

00:55:20.960 Cameron, Osborne, everyone on both sides said it.

00:55:24.080 And then saying that it was advisory.

00:55:25.940 By the way, the government sent out a leaflet.

00:55:27.580 They spent 10 million pounds sending a leaflet to every single house

00:55:30.960 outlying their argument for remaining in the EU,

00:55:34.260 which was predicated on the membership of the single market and the customs union.

00:55:37.880 Right?

00:55:38.700 And then they said, but you didn't know. 1.00

00:55:40.540 You sent out a fucking pamphlet. 1.00

00:55:42.440 Right? 1.00

00:55:42.720 And then you wrote the words, this is your decision.

00:55:44.900 The government will implement what you decide.

00:55:46.880 Ah, but it was advisory.

00:55:49.260 Really?

00:55:49.820 Was that a typo?

00:55:50.620 this is funny

00:55:53.560 so there's loads of room for comedy in this

00:55:56.080 and that's what we should be doing

00:55:57.240 in order to try and

00:55:58.620 make the changes that we need to make

00:56:01.240 I mean this is a seismic change

00:56:02.640 but people are conservative essentially

00:56:04.980 they don't want things to change

00:56:06.400 and this is a massive change

00:56:07.300 and they come up with all these economic predictions

00:56:09.800 we're going to crash out

00:56:11.280 they keep saying that crash

00:56:12.100 we're crashing out with no deal

00:56:14.040 it's world trade rules mate

00:56:15.500 it's fine

00:56:16.220 if you know anything about the history of economics

00:56:18.600 you know that economic predictions are always wrong

00:56:20.380 Bank of England got it wrong with their predictions

00:56:22.680 about what would happen after the vote.

00:56:24.040 They got it so wrong they had to apologise, right?

00:56:25.880 So it's a major opportunity leaving the EU.

00:56:30.040 It's a huge opportunity in terms of world trade.

00:56:32.760 And the EU is a sinking ship anyway.

00:56:34.320 It's breaking apart.

00:56:34.960 It's going to die.

00:56:35.900 Getting out first is a really good thing to do,

00:56:37.940 but we didn't embrace it as an opportunity.

00:56:39.640 Our government saw it as damage limitation,

00:56:42.200 and that's why they weren't able to negotiate a sufficient deal.

00:56:44.680 They weren't able to do it.

00:56:45.440 You can't negotiate a deal that you don't believe in.

00:56:47.520 The majority of MPs on both sides of the House, on Labour and Tory, are Remainers.

00:56:52.660 And they think they know best, and they will find a way to thwart the will of the people.

00:56:58.660 And I hate that phrase, but it is exactly what it is.

00:57:00.800 That's what democracy means.

00:57:02.360 That's what the origin of the word means.

00:57:04.160 They outsourced the decision, but they didn't like the result,

00:57:07.860 and now they're trying to find a way through it with a small print.

00:57:10.880 It's funny.

00:57:11.720 All right, let's end the show by telling Andrew that we both voted Remainer.

00:57:14.300 Yeah, we did.

00:57:15.500 Yeah, because we're good people.

00:57:16.860 Yeah. 1.00

00:57:17.340 You fucking, I fucking knew it. 1.00

00:57:19.760 Brilliant. 1.00

00:57:20.180 Every time he does that joke,

00:57:21.920 we get like hundreds of messages. 1.00

00:57:25.320 Tweets, you fucking freak. 1.00

00:57:26.060 It's a joke. 1.00

00:57:27.220 Can I call you a Nazi now?

00:57:28.320 Yeah, yeah.

00:57:28.800 Because you disagree with me.

00:57:29.980 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:57:30.640 That seems to be the default position.

00:57:32.800 Yeah.

00:57:33.580 All right.

00:57:34.240 Okay, so.

00:57:35.540 Guys, this has been the first episode of our show.

00:57:38.500 You will see that next week

00:57:40.020 when we release our second episode,

00:57:41.820 we are going to talk about that being the first episode.

00:57:44.480 That's because we didn't know which one was going to be first.

00:57:46.340 but this is going to be the first one 0.99

00:57:47.880 so ignore all that shit 0.99

00:57:49.040 and the other one 1.00

00:57:49.660 Andrew Doyle is on Twitter

00:57:52.280 at

00:57:52.780 Andrew Doyle underscore com

00:57:54.740 yeah so go there

00:57:55.580 call him a Nazi 0.87

00:57:56.260 he likes that 0.93

00:57:57.060 join the club

00:57:58.520 join the club

00:57:59.120 everyone else is doing it

00:58:00.620 they might as well get it

00:58:01.560 and come to Comedy Unleashed

00:58:02.420 absolutely come to Comedy Unleashed

00:58:03.980 I've been there

00:58:04.680 Francis is going to be performing there

00:58:06.080 a few really really funny people

00:58:07.400 are going to be there

00:58:08.000 over the next few months

00:58:08.820 it's a great place

00:58:10.020 it's a great place to meet

00:58:10.980 like minded people as well

00:58:12.040 so come along

00:58:12.760 it's absolutely fantastic

00:58:14.340 and like I said

00:58:14.980 I think it's the start

00:58:15.740 of a new thing in comedy

00:58:16.800 and you'll want to be there.

00:58:17.860 You'll want to tell

00:58:18.380 your grandchildren

00:58:18.880 you were there

00:58:19.380 when it happened.

00:58:20.320 So come along.

00:58:21.580 Thanks very much

00:58:22.460 for coming on the show, Andrew.

00:58:23.340 Thank you.

00:58:23.900 And as always,

00:58:24.600 follow us on Twitter,

00:58:26.620 on Facebook,

00:58:27.580 on Instagram.

00:58:29.300 We're going to be talking

00:58:30.140 about stuff that's happening

00:58:31.180 with Patreon

00:58:31.760 and with other ways

00:58:32.980 of supporting the show

00:58:33.880 because that's going to be

00:58:34.940 a bit haywire

00:58:35.380 in later episodes

00:58:37.300 or in a separate clip.

00:58:38.360 So keep an eye out for that.

00:58:39.720 Thank you very much

00:58:40.300 for supporting us as always

00:58:41.440 and we will see you next week.

00:58:43.360 Take care, guys.

00:58:44.080 See you later.

00:58:44.500 Bye-bye.

00:58:44.960 Thanks very much.

00:58:45.740 thinking about a career in real estate start with fleming college our real estate council

00:58:59.500 of ontario approved programs offer flexible online learning and real world training

00:59:04.580 gain the skills to thrive in ontario's diverse market and build your future your way

00:59:09.720 learn more at flemingcollege.ca real estate

TRIGGERnometry - January 28, 2019

Andrew Doyle on Woke Comedy, Left vs Identity Politics and Free Speech

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript