TRIGGERnometry - Graham Linehan：＂I Will Not Bow to Bullies＂

00:00:00.000 Your full Great Outdoors Comedy Festival lineup is here on September 11th through 13th at

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00:00:19.240 Hello and welcome to Trigonometry. I'm Francis Foster. I'm Constantine Kishin.

00:00:24.740 And this is a show for you if you want honest conversations with fascinating people.

00:00:29.800 Our brilliant guest today, I'm delighted to say, is a comedy writer behind some of the most beloved shows in the history of television.

00:00:36.580 Graham Linhan, welcome to Trigonometry.

00:00:38.420 Thank you. Thank you very much for asking.

00:00:40.920 It's a pleasure to have you on.

00:00:42.540 I did mention, obviously, in the intro that you wrote Father Ted, Black Books, The IT Crowd.

00:00:50.160 You were part of the team behind a whole bunch of other shows.

00:00:52.800 But more recently, you've also become very controversial and problematic, which is one

00:00:57.640 of the reasons we're extra delighted to have you on.

00:01:00.840 But before we get into that, we had a bunch of questions just about comedy for you as

00:01:05.500 well.

00:01:06.440 So it seems to me, Graham, that, and this is someone genuinely who's a massive fan of

00:01:10.940 your work, that you operate in what could be seen as a golden age of comedy, you know,

00:01:15.580 the 90s, the early noughties, where there was lots of money to be made.

00:01:19.480 And dare I say it, people are a lot braver now.

00:01:22.800 How do you think the comedy landscape has changed over those last 10 to 15 years?

00:01:28.080 Have we become better, more progressive, or have things got a little bit worse,

00:01:31.220 would you say?

00:01:32.160 When you say more progressive, how do you mean?

00:01:37.300 Do you mean are things improving?

00:01:40.800 That's not what progressive means there, so I think that's why you're getting that.

00:01:44.640 Yeah, yeah.

00:01:46.760 Do you mean, sorry, but genuinely, do you mean the quality of comedy?

00:01:50.620 Yes, I mean the quality of comedy

00:01:53.880 Do you think that we've improved

00:01:55.840 The content has improved

00:01:58.460 Or do you think that we've regressed slightly

00:02:00.900 Do you think that, dare I say it

00:02:03.140 That people are less able to make certain jokes

00:02:05.740 Because they're deemed to be not acceptable

00:02:08.180 Yeah, well, you know, that's

00:02:10.120 I mean, the most revealing thing to me

00:02:12.820 That always happens

00:02:13.800 Is when someone like Dave Chappelle

00:02:16.600 Brings out a special

00:02:17.840 and the headlines read things like

00:02:24.000 Dave Chappelle launches attack on Michael Jackson victims,

00:02:28.860 you know, this type of thing.

00:02:30.380 When, you know, you look at it and it's a setup for a joke.

00:02:35.780 It's obviously the setup for a joke.

00:02:38.320 So you have a very odd situation at the moment

00:02:42.440 where journalists who are kind of setting themselves up

00:02:48.500 as cultural gatekeepers are pretending that for some reason

00:02:54.960 people like Dave Chappelle and Louis C.K.,

00:02:58.560 I realise he's more problematic,

00:03:00.760 but they're pretending that these people are serious

00:03:04.480 when they're telling jokes.

00:03:05.900 And they write them down in journalism pieces.

00:03:09.840 Like I know when Louis C.K. made a routine about those kids who were all shot and David Hogg and people like that, who then went on and, you know, became leaders of an anti-gun movement.

00:03:25.820 He made a routine about them, something. I think he said they were something like selfish, you know, such an absurd thing to say immediately about people who've been the subject of gun attacks, you know, at their school.

00:03:38.760 um and yet it's reported in this most it's reported as if he's i don't know he's trump

00:03:45.400 or something i don't know how to stop my my whatsapp messages getting through while we're

00:03:49.000 this is the level of professionalism we expect but actually on your very point

00:03:54.840 to i wrote a piece about it so i remember the details quite carefully quite accurately i think

00:04:00.820 he didn't actually joke about the people that had been that had been shot what he joked about

00:04:05.680 is the fact that the people who weren't shot

00:04:08.180 were then being held up in the media

00:04:10.120 as these paragons of virtue and truth on the gun debate.

00:04:14.500 And he was saying,

00:04:15.600 the fact that you pushed some fat kid in front of you

00:04:18.220 doesn't make you more interesting.

00:04:19.900 Yeah, which is so obviously, you know,

00:04:25.380 said to produce a huge laugh from the audience, you know,

00:04:30.920 and not serious in any way, you know.

00:04:34.040 Of course.

00:04:34.200 So there's a kind of a weird propaganda exercise going on where all these woke morons are pretending that comedians are serious about their material, you know?

00:04:48.680 So I think I can't, and also an interesting thing happened to me during my cancellation.

00:04:54.400 i've had one or two people uh big names uh meet me for lunch and uh very kindly um i mean you know

00:05:04.820 they don't they don't say they they don't say anything publicly jonathan ross did jonathan

00:05:09.260 ross has been an absolute star um but a few other people uh meet me privately and talk to me about

00:05:15.380 it and one guy met me and he said he said a comedian friend of his said uh the joke that

00:05:21.280 will destroy my career is already out there um and and and that's something that should scare

00:05:27.000 all of us because what it means is that i don't know who said this i think it was richelieu or

00:05:32.620 someone um you may know the quote i'm going for um he said something like give me three letters

00:05:37.600 by a person and i shall destroy them something like that which means that you know you can you

00:05:44.360 can dig into any uh correspondence and find stuff that will hang someone so imagine you have a

00:05:50.780 comedians entire twitter uh history which um which existed before all these taboos became taboos

00:06:00.580 and can be just used to just you know used used to destroy people and i think also another thing

00:06:06.660 that's happening are people like owen jones and and and uh people like that are doing a similar

00:06:12.560 thing they're finding i got something that happened to me during um all of this was um

00:06:19.040 uh the uh uh what's her name uh linda riley of diva mag uh the lesbian magazine for men um

00:06:28.660 and anthony watson of of gl triple a d i think it is

00:06:39.280 But they both did what they did.

00:06:42.640 I mean, it's so obvious what they did.

00:06:44.200 They ran a search on my Twitter timeline for words like cunt and faggot.

00:06:51.780 You know, they found one cunt, which I said to Theresa May, which I've apologized for.

00:06:56.060 I didn't say it to her, I said it about her.

00:06:58.060 And another one they found was a thing where I said, I'd love to program.

00:07:06.080 This was when I was in the middle of Gamergate, which I'd love to talk to you about, because I've got a lot of revised feelings about Gamergate.

00:07:16.280 But during Gamergate, when some gamers were behaving in very kind of anti-gay or misogynistic ways, I said I'd love to program a gay pride march through the middle of Karachi and Call of Duty.

00:07:32.600 you know and I did an impression in quotes of the of the gamers going you know going nuts and going

00:07:39.260 and they found this one and they printed it up as an example of me using the word faggot you know

00:07:46.820 so so it's a it what it what it is is apart from being this censorious uh anti-liberal and

00:07:55.040 an undemocratic thing is, is it, it's a political, uh, lever, you know, uh, I, I, I don't know if

00:08:03.280 you, Benjamin Boyce points this out a lot and it's basically, they're using, um, the language of,

00:08:10.280 of, uh, you know, moral superiority or whatever you want to call it to, um, uh, to, to get ahead,

00:08:18.400 you know, to get political positions, to win student places, you know, it's political,

00:08:27.400 it's purely political. And if you master this language, then, you know, you can get ahead.

00:08:33.040 It's so cynical. It's so cynical, you know. Imagine two gay people writing the word faggot

00:08:38.440 into a search engine, trying to find some example of wrong thing, you know. It's twisted.

00:08:46.320 but anyway sorry I'm I you gotta you gotta stop me rambling I will ramble if I'm no no rambling

00:08:52.120 is great rambling is what the podcast is all about but um also as well but you look at commission

00:08:57.860 comedy and it would seem to me that the quality of comedy that has been that has been commissioned

00:09:03.500 has gone down and do you think that when you look at you know because you look back at Father Ted

00:09:10.180 there were some real instances there where the comedy was very much on the knuckle do you think

00:09:14.680 that that would be allowed to be slipped past now or well the thing is i don't know i mean

00:09:18.900 it's been a long time since i've kind of swum in the in the in those waters i my last uh my last

00:09:27.120 show um motherland is slightly different i'm not involved with motherland anymore but but count

00:09:33.940 author was my attempt to write a family comedy because i kind of thought i kind of thought when

00:09:39.380 you get them right they they go really big you know they can be really successful you know so

00:09:44.400 I did my best and I think I didn't I think we got a couple of things wrong I think the location was

00:09:49.420 wrong um a bit too people didn't want to spend all their time in one of those plastic cafes you know

00:09:55.360 um but but uh uh so so I don't know about that kind of near the local edgy comedy uh anymore

00:10:04.140 more, I don't, I'll give you a good example of something that I can't really see being

00:10:08.620 made now is Brass Eye. I can't see Brass Eye getting anywhere because the, you know, I

00:10:15.280 don't think it's so much a, I don't think it's so much that everyone's become more censorious.

00:10:21.280 I think it's that there's a couple of generations that have grown up with the internet and find

00:10:27.160 any kind of test of their views violent.

00:10:34.420 They think that it's a violent act to question

00:10:37.840 or hold their views up to, you know, ridicule

00:10:44.060 or whatever it happens to be.

00:10:45.200 They think that's literally violence.

00:10:47.960 And it's very hard to get things done.

00:10:51.660 I would imagine it's very hard to circumnavigate

00:10:54.280 all that stuff, you know.

00:10:55.240 my sense also as well just for as an outside observer is

00:10:59.280 i don't know the balls on the commissioners and the producers seem to have shrunk over the decades

00:11:06.500 because in the past i think they would have been prepared to stand up for things that they believed

00:11:11.380 in even if they knew it was going to attract controversy whereas now it seems like you know

00:11:15.360 if you are anticipating there's going to be a few complaints amplified by social media then you'd

00:11:21.020 rather not take that risk do you think that there's an element of truth in that as well

00:11:24.280 uh well you know i wouldn't like to be on the end i mean i've been on the end of

00:11:28.520 no one wants to be on the end of a of a of something like that but on the other hand

00:11:35.460 people really i mean this goes not just for commissioners but for businesses and universities

00:11:40.580 and everyone people have to realize how easy it is to set up a thing where hundreds of people are

00:11:47.560 writing to you telling you that the person you've employed is a monster or whatever it is and and i'm

00:11:53.240 And it's really getting annoying the way these idiots back down as soon as they're, you know, like what I get, there's certain people who regular, certain people I see in my Twitter feed, they're socks for other people.

00:12:10.940 and we know who they are we know you know there's only there's only one of the things that we've

00:12:16.880 been trying to do throughout all this fight is trying to get these lgbt organizations to call

00:12:23.000 out the bad actors in their midst you know you get someone like stephanie hayden who's a fraudster

00:12:27.960 um amy challoner who who uh was you know whose father was an abuser uh had tortured a little

00:12:35.280 girl and then marry the pedophile in america you know it's like these are these are people who

00:12:40.900 should not be involved in safeguarding should not be as amy challoner was running an lgbt youth group

00:12:47.400 for ages 14 plus or something these are these are dangerous people jonathan yaniv is another example

00:12:53.960 and and they're dangerous people and they they um they need to be called out now someone like

00:13:00.960 Yaniv has hundreds of SOC accounts, you know, and he has a, he has a program running that just

00:13:06.860 automatically checks for his name so that he can then report them, you know, and this person got

00:13:13.560 Megan Murphy, one of, you know, an important Canadian feminist, kicked off Twitter forever,

00:13:18.640 you know. Now, people have got to realize that they are being manipulated by sociopaths, you

00:13:25.460 know uh there's other people that you know the the writers of pink news they're they're like

00:13:31.660 demented you know like uh there's one who's written a few pieces on me uh vick what's her

00:13:38.660 name something and um she's just eaten up by rage you know and and it's um you know we gotta stop

00:13:47.840 listening to these people one of the things the internet did and and again this i've made a real

00:13:52.760 journey i've made a real journey over the last couple of years but one of these things into the

00:13:57.500 internet i used to be a bit of a internet uh utopian to some degree i kind of thought i

00:14:03.920 remember when music was being destroyed i thought oh this is great it means it'll it'll make it'll

00:14:09.520 it means indie bands will get bigger and there'll be more access to to and they'll be able to make

00:14:15.160 their own money they'll be able to to skip the middle the record companies the middle man and

00:14:19.300 and they'll make so much money.

00:14:20.720 It's just bullshit.

00:14:21.720 They're all fucking starving, you know?

00:14:24.100 And it was because capitalism was too robust, you know?

00:14:29.020 And all these people just thought, no, no, I'd write, you know,

00:14:31.360 if we can't make money, then the musicians will starve.

00:14:33.780 That was the deal, you know?

00:14:35.640 And I used to think, and another thing that I thought was great

00:14:39.880 was the fact that with Facebook and Twitter and all these things,

00:14:44.420 I thought that we, this kind of hive mind, which is not, actually that sounds too, like I'm saying, people would become, would walk in lockstep, which has happened, which is terrible.

00:14:58.660 But I did think that the connectivity that we all had would lead to, I thought it would lead to breakthroughs in science.

00:15:07.180 I thought it would lead, I mean, when I say it, it sounds completely reasonable, doesn't it?

00:15:11.700 I don't think you're wrong, actually, Graham. And I want to get into the story of how you've kind of evolved because you've gone through quite a journey. But I don't think you're wrong. I think it has had massive, massive benefits.

00:15:21.580 Oh, sure.

00:15:22.200 But it's also had a lot of disadvantages.

00:15:24.640 But since we've delved into the whole story.

00:15:27.600 Just to finish my thought just very quickly.

00:15:29.160 I'll just say that what has happened that I think is very, very dangerous is that a bunch of sociopaths have injected themselves into the world brain.

00:15:42.300 Yeah.

00:15:42.540 And we are now repeating things that are insane.

00:15:46.500 You know, they're just insane because these sociopaths are working the controls.

00:15:50.560 No, I know what you mean.

00:15:51.420 so let's let's dig into that but let's start at the beginning because i introduced you as the the

00:15:57.120 man behind some of the most beloved shows in the history of television i don't think that's

00:16:00.760 inaccurate so you've got a great career you're you're going along nicely you're working uh you

00:16:07.220 know you're respected loved your work is loved and then suddenly you go from that to being cautioned

00:16:13.900 by the police for dead naming and i wasn't cautioned you weren't cautioned sorry you were spoken to by

00:16:20.660 the police yeah that was stephanie hayden the uh who's very funny uh stephanie hayden in court

00:16:26.480 they said um they they pointed out that she was convicted for he was convicted for fraud i'm not

00:16:31.420 calling stephanie hayden is she it's a no way um but uh he um he was convicted for fraud and he said

00:16:38.300 oh that was just for passing bad checks in wales right so yeah and got the police uh they said do

00:16:48.920 know stephanie hayden and i thought they were calling because they caught him because because

00:16:54.600 he you know he's a fraudster and he ripped off this guy called um fat b this bloke who's trying

00:17:00.200 to open a uh open a restaurant in london he ripped him off for something like 27 000 pounds

00:17:06.360 so um i thought great the police have called me and i'm going to be able to put this guy behind

00:17:10.600 bars but no they called me to stop stop uh to leave him alone you know and this was i had i'd

00:17:16.520 had him blocked by this stage so basically what hayden was doing was he was getting the police to

00:17:21.880 call and he said and he sued me on the same weekend because how hayden works is he likes to

00:17:27.000 he's done this he did this to a transsexual friend of mine in norwich um uh he he sues you he calls

00:17:33.800 police on the same weekend he doesn't send a letter of intent or whatever it's called the

00:17:38.140 thing that says if you take this down i won't sue you he he does it all to maximize the stress

00:17:44.240 that he puts people under uh and that's who the police call me and that's what the guardian story

00:17:49.900 is right so but what i want to get into before we get into all the nitty-gritty yeah sorry

00:17:55.320 certain hobby horses and once i know no i get it because it's it's a very personal as someone who's

00:18:02.640 been in the middle of a media storm myself i understand all of that the little details piss

00:18:06.840 you off and it's it's all there but what i want to understand is first and foremost what made you

00:18:12.020 decide to go from beloved cultural figure to this guy on the internet talking about women's rights

00:18:19.920 and being attacked by trans activists what was it that you were like i can't stomach this anymore

00:18:25.420 i have to speak on this i'm not sure that it was uh one single thing it was uh after a while like

00:18:33.040 once you recognize this you realize that there is a real lockdown on um on information about this

00:18:41.520 you know, and I was in my Twitter bubble of liberal left-leaning people, and I would see

00:18:48.600 things every so often that, like, I remember one that said, you know, when I was thinking,

00:18:53.660 why are so many people trans now? Everyone's brother is trans, you know, everyone, you know,

00:19:00.260 and then I saw a thing that said, it said it's because more accepted now, more people are coming

00:19:05.700 out as trans you know and and i remember reading all this and thinking oh okay maybe that's true

00:19:13.140 you know but the more i kind of thought about it and the more crazy stuff that started coming out

00:19:17.620 i i i realized i was being gaslit you know and then and then something happened it was coming

00:19:24.580 to the end of the irish uh uh repeal the eighth uh campaign which me and my wife had um my wife

00:19:32.260 and i had uh had participated in and uh i think to to pretty good effect i think we made a video

00:19:38.940 that was quite powerful and um it did a lot of good you know but um but the people who were

00:19:46.100 running the the the repeal thing in ireland included a bunch of people who i'll give you

00:19:51.600 an example of what they did they ran a thing they had a blocker up called repeal shield

00:19:56.060 And Repeal Shield was supposedly to block MAGA types.

00:20:03.500 But it also, without telling anyone, they also put feminists in there, you know.

00:20:10.280 Feminists do love Donald Trump.

00:20:12.280 Big fans, big fans.

00:20:14.320 So, and at the same time, they got marriage equality passed and they did that thing.

00:20:19.420 I don't know if you saw the legal document that Denton's, Denton's is this legal firm.

00:20:25.480 this is amazing, who advise, trans activists wanted to pass something that said that kids

00:20:31.820 didn't have to consult their parents or didn't have to get their parents' permission if they

00:20:37.340 began transitioning, right? And they wanted to get that put into law. And a law firm called

00:20:43.060 Denton's advised, wrote this document where they said, look to Ireland. Ireland did great work

00:20:50.780 passing gender id uh on the back of more successful or more popular reforms like marriage equality

00:20:57.060 you know so they that's what they did they slipped it in and they and another thing that

00:21:02.420 danton's document said is um try and avoid the media you know i mean as i've said before what

00:21:09.800 kind of what kind of civil rights group avoids the media you know so so all this stuff was piling

00:21:17.000 up and and then i i had cancer and i was i was in i i i was on morphine this was i i always have to

00:21:25.200 include that because i think the morphine made me a lot braver than i should have been

00:21:30.440 but i was on my hospital bed and uh and i got and i saw a thing that said uh you know now we've

00:21:39.340 dealt with repeal this is an irish person now we've dealt with repeal i want i i want to tell

00:21:43.340 Graham Linehan is a TERF and they included a bunch of things I'd liked and so on you know the usual

00:21:49.380 things that are just no one could object to unless you're insane you know like trans people deserve

00:21:55.320 respect and help but women deserve their rights too that's it you know so I saw that I was being

00:22:03.480 cancelled and I kind of got a bit sick of it then and I kind of thought well what am I saying that's

00:22:10.920 wrong and I and I examined it and it wasn't anything I wasn't saying anything wrong you know

00:22:17.300 and I still stand by I've never really said anything like this stuff you know I can back up

00:22:22.960 all my opinions you know but Graham wasn't there a part of you that I mean you clearly feel strongly

00:22:28.720 about this and that's fine but wasn't there a self-preservation gene that was like hang on mate

00:22:33.580 if you tweet this you're going to get into some serious problems because we've all written a tweet

00:22:38.620 and then looked at him and thought, no, better delete that.

00:22:43.040 Do you not have that?

00:22:44.860 Well, no, because I wasn't saying anything wrong.

00:22:48.700 I was saying, and also I was standing up for reality.

00:22:51.600 I mean, like I saw, did you see the thing I tweeted yesterday?

00:22:57.840 The guy who got thanked by the Board of Educators?

00:23:01.280 No, I didn't.

00:23:02.380 Oh, yeah, okay, here it is.

00:23:03.480 This is just extraordinary.

00:23:05.120 I'll send it to you.

00:23:05.840 um and you know i've sent this to various people who i hate like uh like uh you know josie long

00:23:14.300 and and owen jones and so on and um and they never answer because there's no answer to it

00:23:20.400 you know and it's this it's this guy like so anyway that's a man right that is a man okay

00:23:26.280 please put it please put me saying that this is a man over the shot of the man please yeah that's

00:23:32.200 the man and and um if we are to make comedy there has to be a base of reality there has to be and

00:23:45.100 any form of writing you have to have a base of reality so if something like this is happening

00:23:52.040 you have two choices you can you can adopt you can adapt to the new reality or you can fight

00:23:58.360 against it and I just chose to fight against it because comedy is impossible if that's a woman

00:24:03.520 impossible you know and you talk about adapting to reality one of the things I wanted to raise

00:24:10.920 with you is the Count Dankula case okay because you've gone through quite an evolution on many

00:24:18.380 issues that being a good example where you know we've had Dankula on the show uh and we've talked

00:24:24.000 him about his case and i think at the time you felt that his joke was you know it was a way of

00:24:31.780 supporting the the nazis or he wasn't maybe a nazi or maybe he's far right and i think you even

00:24:39.260 helped or kind of organize the taking down of his gofundme page and stuff like that

00:24:44.480 and you've since then you know to change your position to diametrically the opposite and i

00:24:49.560 think you you apologize to Marcus so talk to us about that and what happened there because the

00:24:55.060 issue of free speech in relation to all of these things is kind of the crucial issue because if you

00:24:59.600 can't talk about what the truth is then it becomes very difficult doesn't it yeah but but I have to

00:25:07.360 say that my interest in this doesn't come from a free speech angle I think it's even more

00:25:13.720 fundamental in a weird way it's really about being able to say what reality is I think if we're not

00:25:18.620 able to say what reality is then we will go mad right but that's what's free speech is poor is

00:25:23.660 my is my point Graham is you if you don't have free speech then you can't say what reality is

00:25:27.620 sure but but but I my I thought the reality of Count Dankula was that he was a uh he you know

00:25:35.780 I saw that he had videos on Stormfront I saw that he was he was taking pictures with Tommy Robinson

00:25:40.840 You know, and I did that thing that I assembled an identikit of him

00:25:47.800 that possibly wasn't true, that possibly wasn't the whole truth, you know.

00:25:55.080 But I do think, you know, things like the Kekistan flag and all that stuff,

00:26:01.560 they really, I do find all that stuff grim because it was, to me,

00:26:06.320 it was kind of cheering on one of the worst things that's happened to humanity, which

00:26:11.380 is Trump's win, you know. I wonder, if we get four more years, will the world survive

00:26:18.020 it, you know. So, you know, I, and also at that point, I saw the rise of the far right

00:26:23.420 and I was really worried about it, really scared they were getting a hold. And I saw

00:26:27.600 this and, you know, I combined that with, there was a thing I think Vox Dei wrote or

00:26:33.460 someone like that about how to hide your real uh uh uh anti-semitic or or whatever it happens to be

00:26:41.820 intentions within um comedy because comedy is easier to absorb and stuff like that but with

00:26:48.320 with dankula i just think i mean i know now that he's like he he's just someone who just i don't

00:26:56.300 know likes poking those buttons i guess you know but um uh uh yeah but you know i mean i mean the

00:27:05.000 thing about the the getting the funding brought down was i really i remember later after i

00:27:10.040 apologized that he did say it was for an appeal that never happened and i i do remember that

00:27:14.700 that around that time they were a lot of right-wing people were monetizing these uh these

00:27:22.440 these stances and i kind of put him under that umbrella you know and the appeal did happen just

00:27:29.060 to be just to be fair to him the appeal did happen yeah yeah yeah well then i i add my

00:27:33.720 look no i'm not i'm not trying to get you to apologize again because you already did what i

00:27:38.420 want to find out is um one of the things i found very interesting when when the article came out

00:27:44.440 and you retweeted it yourself and said you partly agree with it um was that you said you were now

00:27:50.720 skeptical about some of the people who were cheering you on as you were criticizing Dankula.

00:27:56.980 Talk to us about that.

00:27:58.480 Well, when Gamergate started, I mean, Gamergate was something that I felt proud of right up

00:28:05.080 until recently, you know, because I saw it as just a misogynistic hate campaign.

00:28:12.640 In fact, don't tell me...

00:28:13.940 Sorry to interrupt, Graham, because there'll be people listening and watching it who might

00:28:17.500 not know what Gamergate is.

00:28:19.020 Can you just give a brief description of what it is

00:28:21.240 and then your attitudes to it?

00:28:23.000 Yeah, and my description,

00:28:25.420 I'll try and make my description what I thought it was,

00:28:28.040 what I now realize it was, and how it's changed.

00:28:32.500 What I thought Gamergate was in its entirety,

00:28:36.160 again, like with Dankula,

00:28:37.920 was a hate campaign aimed at women in the gaming industry

00:28:42.060 that was, you know,

00:28:46.640 they were, I was employing things like swatting, you know, there were women gamers who were being,

00:28:52.800 the fucking swat teams were coming to their house, killing, you know, one woman, I think her dog was

00:28:56.720 killed, because that's the first thing they do when a swat team comes around to your house,

00:29:00.080 they shoot you up, you know, so again, because it was women being targeted, my anger reflexes

00:29:08.460 got up, because that's the thing I really can't bear, and I just jumped into it, and

00:29:15.400 And that's what I thought it was.

00:29:17.380 But what it really was, was a confluence of millions of different things happening at

00:29:22.580 the same time.

00:29:23.280 There were a lot of, and I now realize there were a lot of young men who were much closer

00:29:29.880 to the truth of what was happening in colleges and stuff than I was, who realized that there

00:29:35.500 was this censorious, illiberal, cancelling kind of culture that was really dangerous,

00:29:43.960 you know?

00:29:44.240 And they were all mixed up with the real right-wingers and people like Yiannopoulos, who it seemed to me was very cynically cashing in and trying to recruit young men into the right.

00:30:01.900 In fact, I think he actually said that that's what he was doing.

00:30:05.300 So, you know, at the time, I was just very hardline.

00:30:08.560 I was like, you know, people would say, what is Gamergate?

00:30:11.520 I'm always confused by Gamergate.

00:30:12.600 And I would say, it's a misogynistic hate campaign, and that's all it is, you know.

00:30:16.360 I had a very hard line, you know, view of it.

00:30:18.940 But I now realize that a lot of the people on my side, like there was one person called Super Gamer Girl, you know.

00:30:28.300 And I saw a picture of a bald bloke with a huge beard, you know.

00:30:32.980 And these are the people who were doing all this.

00:30:37.740 I thought I was defending women some of the time.

00:30:40.220 And some of the time I wasn't even, I was defending blokes, you know.

00:30:45.260 So it was, it's, so I now see that what it really is, is a kind of a tribalistic war,

00:30:52.920 especially in America between, between two groups is a kind of anarchic kind of Bernie

00:31:01.040 bro types, I guess you'd say.

00:31:02.420 And then on the other side, you have these, a combination of MAGA types, but also, you

00:31:08.920 know people who are just who just like pushing the buttons on the other side you know I think

00:31:13.520 it's all bad because it in the end it you know you can't treat everything like a joke I remember

00:31:18.940 when Trump won a bunch of right-wingers said we did it we elected a meme you know and and and it

00:31:25.680 might be fun and you might feel and I'm sure it gives you a huge feeling of power but you know

00:31:31.100 it's it's now killing their friends and family you know so so I mean with you know the response

00:31:36.500 coronavirus so so my my by after by being cancelled and getting into this fight i realized that

00:31:47.740 there were a lot more currents that i was aware of um and i and to be honest with you i'm i'm very

00:31:56.260 proud of the um i'm very proud of what i've done in the uh women's rights thing recently but i i

00:32:04.600 think i may have made a few mistakes in the game of day time yeah but i think that's not an un you

00:32:09.960 know some people will look at that and go oh he was a hypocrite which i think one of the articles

00:32:14.640 said about you i actually think someone who's able to change their mind over time i think that's

00:32:19.280 something that every person should be proud of is growing as a human being and learning and

00:32:23.360 changing your mind as you realize more i think that's pretty pretty it's a healthy thing to do

00:32:28.320 yeah absolutely I mean you know one thing that I've realized uh recently is um something we

00:32:36.440 should all guard against is certainty you know and uh and I like being on this side of this fight

00:32:42.300 because so many people are telling us we're wrong me and the feminists I support that you spend

00:32:47.880 most of your time going am I wrong I'm thinking about it and kind of you know and then and then

00:32:53.000 I don't know. I'm actually okay. It's something that one should do. And I think my experience

00:32:59.620 of Gamergate will mean that I do that more often, probably.

00:33:03.720 And Graeme, don't you think part of the problem with the internet is that we have these discussions

00:33:08.560 or debates, whether it's the trans debate, which is incredibly nuanced. There's a lot

00:33:13.600 of depth to this. And we're trying to do it over Twitter. I know, I can't remember how

00:33:18.260 many characters twitter has but you simply can't do it over that type of platform and also as well

00:33:24.700 it's really in order to have these types of conversations debate they really need to be

00:33:30.260 done face to face aren't they wouldn't you say but yeah but it's not happening because they

00:33:34.740 like as you know one of the one of stonewall's um uh cast iron rules was no debate you know

00:33:41.300 they this denton's document which which uh perhaps you could put in the link to your uh i'll send

00:33:47.100 you i'll send you put it in the link in the video you know saying to avoid media uh scrutiny is is

00:33:55.020 just extraordinary and and you'll notice when have you ever seen a debate between two opposing sides

00:33:59.700 they're so rare they're so rare and it's because what happens and it's another brilliant way of

00:34:04.900 silencing the women in this because they're using the uh the news kind of um ecosystem

00:34:11.460 against it against itself because the news won't get someone on unless there's an opposing view

00:34:16.800 So if they get someone like Kathleen Stock on to talk about something, then the other side can go, no, she's a tariff.

00:34:24.880 I'm not appearing with her. And then the piece just doesn't happen, you know.

00:34:29.340 So, yeah, I agree. Twitter is a terrible place for it to happen.

00:34:34.000 But, you know, I thought I'd use it in a different way.

00:34:37.960 I thought I would just keep hammering, hammering, hammering, hammering the points home over and over again until people couldn't mistake the points.

00:34:46.800 and even that doesn't work because yesterday i got message from two bearded blue tick idiots

00:34:53.560 who are like i'd love to know what happened to gray minute what the fuck how how you know my

00:35:01.140 timeline is right there you know and none of the things i'm posting there's a good answer to so

00:35:07.460 they just ignore it it's the strangest thing but yeah twitter makes it possible to do that for some

00:35:12.200 reason i think gaslighting is the term you used and i think when it comes to you know look you've

00:35:17.320 seen i interview with the posy parker for example where you know we pushed back on her pretty hard

00:35:21.380 about some of the things because that's our job and we get to try to get to the bottom of some

00:35:25.540 of these conversations but you know there's biological reality and we are now in a position

00:35:32.240 that you found yourself in that when you express clearly what is in my view and this is why i don't

00:35:38.060 think they do much polling on this because they know what would happen if they did polling on this

00:35:41.640 right that's the view of 95 percent of the country if you say to people if you're born a man

00:35:47.400 you know can you change your sex most people would say no right now that's not because they

00:35:53.460 hate trans people it's just because it's a fundamental biological reality and we are now

00:35:58.580 in a position where you know if you if you if you express strongly your view that that is the case

00:36:04.840 you're automatically considered transphobic yeah i know i mean that's it and and the bar is so low

00:36:11.060 like we've seen what happened to jk rowling when she when she tweeted a completely compassionate

00:36:16.940 and reasonable thing you know and then they can't they there's also so many trans people who agree

00:36:22.540 with us more and more every day you know who are just who are just uh in despair at the damage

00:36:29.060 that's being done because of these

00:36:31.040 lunatics, you know, and there

00:36:32.700 does have to be a little, there does

00:36:35.020 have to be gatekeeping in this sense

00:36:36.860 because there are certainly different types

00:36:38.900 of people who are drawn to this, you know

00:36:40.700 there are, like

00:36:42.100 the

00:36:43.700 ideology is so

00:36:47.080 incoherent that

00:36:49.060 it means that, I mean, you know

00:36:51.020 the best example of how incoherent

00:36:52.880 the ideology is

00:36:54.600 is that Karen White

00:36:56.060 the trans

00:36:58.060 woman, I don't even think

00:37:00.580 it's a trans woman, it's a bloke, it's a bloke,

00:37:02.320 take the piss, but Karen White

00:37:04.280 got into a women's prison

00:37:06.380 and sexually

00:37:08.600 assaulted four women in a women's

00:37:10.700 prison in the UK, where

00:37:12.540 segregation is still the law of the land.

00:37:14.780 That's how bamboozled

00:37:16.480 the prison service

00:37:18.600 were by Stonewall's advice.

00:37:20.700 And that kind of advice

00:37:22.140 is now seen

00:37:24.660 through so many

00:37:26.580 different kind of institutions and so on and it and it doesn't it doesn't hold up it doesn't hold

00:37:32.380 up to anything so you're you're constantly second guessing yourself and i remember someone wrote a

00:37:38.340 brilliant thing where they said i've written i've written something hopefully it isn't transphobic

00:37:43.080 and it's like it's like they've just kind of painted themselves into the stupidest corner

00:37:50.800 you know and I mean the only I wish there was some like like it makes no difference at all

00:37:57.260 but I tagged in this morning I sent that photograph of that bloke to John Ronson and Frankie Boyle

00:38:04.640 and a few other people who uh who who do the trans women or women thing I said you know is

00:38:11.300 this a woman or whatever you know and they they Billy Bragg immediately blocked me you know and

00:38:16.660 it's like it's just hilarious they can't they can't answer the questions that they've set up

00:38:23.400 for themselves you know what i mean it's so strange so so um anyway sorry i rambled again

00:38:29.600 no but you know the one thing i wanted to talk about and actually with the three of us because

00:38:34.000 it's unresolved for me is you know francis and i do you remember francis when we first

00:38:38.060 even started getting people on to talk about this we were like well you know it's it's a minority

00:38:44.220 issue isn't it it's like something that you know affects like no point whatever percent of the

00:38:48.360 population is it really worth talking is it really that interesting but I was always standing with

00:38:54.460 women Graham just but it's it's become a major issue if I think for the reason that you say

00:39:04.540 because yes of course the women's rights issue is a big one but it speaks to a much more

00:39:09.640 fundamental thing which is do we live in a society where you are able to speak the truth

00:39:16.080 and what this is revealing is there are areas of life on where you are not able to speak the truth

00:39:23.660 because if you do you know at best people will have the experience that you've had right sure

00:39:29.980 yeah but the shame is that all you need is all all we need to happen is for more people to raise

00:39:36.620 their voice you know the biggest the biggest problem is people frightened to say to say it

00:39:42.020 people who are you know i mean a lot of women on twitter have to be uh anonymous who are talking

00:39:48.260 about this because um because if they use their they're scared of using their real accounts because

00:39:53.700 they might get banned you know and i remember when twitter brought in their misgendering rules

00:39:58.060 one tweet said uh twitter changed their terms and conditions so misgendering is not a happy

00:40:04.360 hunting everyone you know and they so this is men silencing women you know so um so yeah it's

00:40:11.700 which i personally approve of but but it's it's the russian way mate it's the russian way

00:40:17.220 but it's kind of um uh but but what i just there's two things i don't understand first

00:40:23.300 thing is i don't understand why more people aren't speaking up because once you speak up

00:40:26.460 you create a you create an atmosphere that makes makes it okay for other people to speak up

00:40:32.500 and suddenly you're not alone suddenly like me for instance I'm completely isolated amongst my

00:40:37.320 celebrity friends at the moment one or two people who are speaking up for me um who I'll always be

00:40:41.860 grateful to but for the most part they not only don't speak up for you they actually come out

00:40:46.920 against you like you know I I showed a photograph of some 50 year old chancer um on a on a on a

00:40:55.140 college basketball team with some girls you know and John Ronson criticized me for sharing the

00:41:01.220 photograph not for this pervert on this team um uh you know taking advantage again of these

00:41:08.580 incoherent rules so um i just find it's just extraordinary people won't just uh not say

00:41:15.520 anything but they'll go the extra mile and they'll actually throw women under the bus you know i mean

00:41:20.820 ronson god almighty it it blows my mind you know the king of nuance and he and he believes that

00:41:27.820 he believes that trans women are women, you know, it's just, he does not see any of the

00:41:33.220 problems. He doesn't see the danger. He doesn't think women's sports are important enough to be

00:41:36.760 bothered about. He doesn't, uh, he doesn't, um, uh, think that, uh, you know, the safeguarding

00:41:43.040 problems that arise, you know, I, you, I don't know if you have, or whether you should, you

00:41:48.900 follow my feet at all, but you know, one of the things I, I, I share that blows me away is a sign

00:41:55.700 in a toilet that says if you see anyone in here that looks out of place don't question them they

00:42:01.040 know better than you do you know if you're a young girl and a man approaches you in a fucking toilet

00:42:06.920 then a poster like that is making that young girl less safe it's taking even more power away from

00:42:13.860 that young girl you know so the fact that someone like Frankie Boyle and sorry I love naming them

00:42:19.540 I fucking hate him so much.

00:42:22.520 But Frankie Boyle and John Ransom,

00:42:25.040 Josie Long and all these people,

00:42:26.700 the fact that they will fight,

00:42:29.440 fight for that man and not for that young girl,

00:42:32.320 it blows my mind every day, you know?

00:42:35.640 To be honest with you,

00:42:36.820 sometimes I read your tweets and I'm like,

00:42:39.240 wow, that is, you know,

00:42:41.160 very much like you said yourself,

00:42:42.920 like a blunt instrument.

00:42:44.420 Do you sometimes think that actually

00:42:46.060 if you approach this subject

00:42:47.840 with a little bit more nuance in your tweets,

00:42:50.380 a little bit gentler,

00:42:51.400 maybe a little bit more of a conciliatory tone,

00:42:54.960 that the blowback wouldn't be as harsh on you?

00:42:58.340 Well, no, because as you know,

00:43:01.460 they don't accept anything.

00:43:03.860 Like J.K. Rowling got cancelled because of one tweet.

00:43:07.020 Yeah.

00:43:07.460 So if that's how it's going to be,

00:43:10.200 then you might as well tell the truth and the whole truth.

00:43:13.460 you know and also the the trans women who support me in this uh not many a couple of trans men who

00:43:21.060 support me uh and a lot of detransitioners who are who are very nice to me as well but but um

00:43:25.900 but the trans women who support me in this people like debbie hayton and christina harrison i mean

00:43:32.220 christina harrison said a brilliant thing in her speech um she said uh she talked about eddie

00:43:37.360 Izzard said that Eddie Izzard is now saying he has, you know, trans status, you know. And she

00:43:43.220 said that she used to admire Eddie Izzard when he used to say that he was a transvestite, or that

00:43:48.260 he was a crossdresser, or whatever you want to call it. But now that he's saying this, you know,

00:43:53.400 she said something like, but he's not a woman, and neither am I, you know. And that's the trans

00:43:58.920 women I'm friends with, brave, you know, they kind of face their dysphoria, they face their

00:44:04.920 condition with with real uh with you know from a reality-based mindset and and they're much happier

00:44:12.020 than all these miserable people who are who spend their time hunting feminists down and and you know

00:44:18.120 you know it's it's it's just it's we're encouraging a form of mental illness do you think do you think

00:44:28.300 we're making some progress on it though graham i mean we've just had the review of the gender

00:44:32.480 recognition act in the uk which now says that you have to be 18 before you uh before you're able to

00:44:39.480 transition do you think we're starting to uh see that reality is making a comeback i do a little

00:44:46.620 bit yeah yeah i think that um you know it's it's as a as a lifelong lefty uh although i've lost my

00:44:55.760 tribalism completely um you know it's galling that getting cancelled will do that to you

00:45:01.320 it's galling that the conservatives did it but but you know i don't care who stands up for women

00:45:08.320 as honest someone does you know and and they've been great and the and labor have been an absolute

00:45:14.180 joke i mean here's here's how fundamentally uh this issue destroys women's rights joe swinson

00:45:23.440 I think lost because of it if you can't answer who what a woman is on tv then how can anyone

00:45:31.180 vote for you you know and the labor leaders all the all the women labor leaders made absolute

00:45:36.900 pricks of themselves on uh on tv you know Lisa Nandy said that pedophiles should be housed with

00:45:43.320 um with male with female prisoners uh uh Dawn Butler with her with her babies are born without

00:45:50.300 of sex i don't agree with what miranda yardly said about that i think she meant it i think

00:45:54.840 she doubled down on it um and uh you know i'm calling most outrageously of all and i really

00:46:01.840 wish they'd sue but they keep having their funding stopped so it's hard for them to sue anyone but

00:46:07.800 lgb alliance and women's place uk i know these fucking women you know they include people like

00:46:13.920 Linda Bellos, you know, who started Black History Month, I think, in the UK. Helen Steele, who sued

00:46:22.220 McDonald's on her own and won, you know. These are absolute stars of left-wing activism. And

00:46:29.720 they're being, you know, Helen Steele had a pint of beer thrown in her face when she turned up to

00:46:34.440 defend a student who was being bullied for being gender critical. You know, the lack of respect

00:46:42.800 for left-wing heroes is extraordinary you know um again sometimes i get waylaid and i'm not sure

00:46:50.860 where i began that's what we began with me asking whether you think we're making progress so i think

00:46:55.400 the the gender recognition act situation certainly i think you'd consider progress

00:46:59.920 yeah kira bell is going to be huge when kira bell wins her case even if she loses and people see

00:47:06.800 this per kid who whose voice is now a man's voice and whose facial structure has been changed forever

00:47:13.360 um who says she shouldn't have been told she shouldn't have been let do these things to

00:47:18.420 herself when she was 16 when more people see this they'll they'll wake up i think and graham

00:47:25.780 so you think that we're we're moving essentially in the right direction now do you think that with

00:47:31.800 covid we might see a gentler kinder i can already tell what your answer is going to be but yeah no

00:47:38.400 i i it's been great hasn't it i mean i don't know about you but i've been doing i mean you you kind

00:47:42.640 of do lots of video stuff anyway but i've been i've been seeing more people you know since the

00:47:47.780 covid thing started you know so uh it seems not also i i have a feeling we'll come out of it

00:47:53.300 thinking wondering whether the five-day week is actually uh a good idea whether you know we should

00:47:59.020 have three days to hang out with our kids rather than five rather than two and do you know what

00:48:03.680 i mean i think things i think that might maybe maybe we'll get more kids learning at home i

00:48:08.780 don't know i think it could be good it could be good long term my big worry is i need to get the

00:48:13.100 fucking theaters open to so so i can put on the ted musical you know that's that's the that's the

00:48:19.080 thing i'm i really need to happen don't we all david oh so david sorry what i could have kind

00:48:24.880 So I've been living on my own.

00:48:27.040 I can be anyone you want me to see.

00:48:30.400 You see, what happened there is we've just had an Iris guest on the show

00:48:34.720 and he just thinks you're all the same, mate.

00:48:36.960 That's what that is.

00:48:38.300 But it's fine because you're white and a man, therefore I can do that.

00:48:41.360 Stop being white fragile or showing white fragility to me.

00:48:46.720 But the one thing I wanted to talk to you about as well,

00:48:49.160 and it's because we touch on cancellation,

00:48:51.720 and you've been very jokey about it,

00:48:53.520 but what did what was cancellation what happened to you and what were the implications of it well

00:49:00.160 funnily enough i i i kind of planned for it all this in a weird way i did i did say to myself

00:49:07.280 i'm going to do this for a while uh i had some money from my cancer treatment so i thought i

00:49:13.100 would uh so so i and you know and people were being nice to me because i'd had cancer so i

00:49:18.440 thought well i'll use this time to not work and i'll just throw myself into this and i'll be

00:49:23.840 protected for a while by the the cancer money and uh and then i got the ted musical you know so

00:49:29.240 hopefully the ted musical will um uh will be fine so and and you know because i thought

00:49:33.620 if they attack the ted musical it will just kind of bring more attention to it

00:49:38.320 and they'll see and the wider public will see how insane this stuff is um but you know then

00:49:45.480 the TED musical took a lot longer than I thought uh um and and and and the things I did try and

00:49:53.240 uh get going uh nearly all of them you know went nowhere I had one phone call from a guy

00:49:59.740 who uh who you know he picked up the phone full of enthusiasm uh offers me this great job uh

00:50:07.440 and I said okay yeah no great that's brilliant you know put down the phone maybe five minutes

00:50:11.720 later calls him back sorry it's been taken by someone else i was you know and and i and i thought

00:50:17.520 about it for a while and i mean i realized i knew exactly what happened this guy went out to the to

00:50:22.940 the office and he said guess what everybody i got rame linhon to do it you know and the intern put

00:50:30.200 up their hand and said he's a bigot and that's it you know because you don't want to get the

00:50:36.120 you don't want to get the uh the younger members of staff angry you know so so uh yeah so that's

00:50:42.760 so you lost work you lost friends yeah you've had the police call you i feel good about the friends

00:50:48.960 i swapped out my my my fair weather friends for feminists and and you know people who really

00:50:56.040 believe in things so may i know exactly what you mean that is one of the great things about doing

00:51:01.300 this show for us is we've swapped all the people that we thought were our friends yeah that weren't

00:51:06.660 our friends for people that actually understand what we're talking about and why we're doing it

00:51:10.880 and you know and they might not agree with us on every issue of politics but they they understand

00:51:16.180 the importance of truth and reality over bullshit and conformity he's lying we're complete on our

00:51:21.540 wrong Graham this is it send us money I used to kind of I think I may even have sent you something

00:51:31.200 snarky once uh I'm ashamed to say because I used to hate terms like triggered and and all that sort

00:51:37.900 of stuff because I thought it was kind of and even even now I still not a huge fan of things like

00:51:42.980 titania mcgrath because i find all that stuff what i now realize is that is that it was it

00:51:51.740 was actually true these you know all this stuff was true and and and i do find my thing is you

00:52:00.480 can't it's hard to make fun of it when the true stuff is so mad you know and um and i realized

00:52:07.100 but i really and so i thought that people were exaggerating i thought people were exaggerating

00:52:12.480 about the state of, you know, cancel culture

00:52:15.500 and all that sort of stuff.

00:52:16.700 And I think a lot of people think that, you know.

00:52:20.320 But of course, it's so true.

00:52:23.060 People get fired for the most insane things,

00:52:26.880 like Helen Watts, who's a girl guide leader, you know,

00:52:32.440 who objected to not only boys suddenly being able

00:52:39.820 to sleep in the same tent as girls,

00:52:41.580 but but girl guide leaders being able to be men and the parents don't have to be notified

00:52:49.480 yeah yeah legal to notify them yeah and even on even on a smaller level i mean as the sector guy

00:52:56.920 who shared the billy connolly routine about religion on his facebook yeah and the routine

00:53:04.380 was a from a dvd that they sell in asda i know right so so that's where but you know on titania

00:53:13.320 and you know triggered and all this kind of stuff i mean i think andrew doyle and titania is actually

00:53:18.000 a very good it's a mirror you know and that that is the function of comedy sometimes particularly

00:53:23.240 satire not so much comedy but satire is to hold up a mirror to society and say look this is what

00:53:28.700 it looks like you know yeah and and that's not comfortable and people don't like it just like

00:53:33.280 they don't like you making things black and white in the way that some things in life are you're

00:53:38.500 saying is this a man or is this a woman people don't like that because it forces them to confront

00:53:43.340 their own duplicity and their own weakness and their own fear that's why people don't like it

00:53:48.820 that's why i think some people don't like titania and the same with us i mean yes we call the show

00:53:53.140 trigonometry but it's actually more of a trigger warning than anything we're saying if you're

00:53:57.800 uncomfortable with controversial discussions don't watch you know we're not we're not 12 year

00:54:03.220 olds right now oh i'm triggered you know like yeah yeah yeah yeah no i get that now i get that

00:54:07.920 again you know there there's i can talk about myself as a kind of a lab rat you know and we

00:54:16.940 must talk someday about about how i thought about all these things you know because i i kind of see

00:54:24.140 now i don't know for for me it's like do you remember when um well do you remember sorry

00:54:31.360 but uh the head of the mi5 head of mi5 was a russian agent who was that again

00:54:38.480 uh uh what was his name you're very very close into racism here you keep alive mate

00:54:44.000 mate mate be kind you're talking about his uncle come on

00:54:47.680 who was it though

00:54:51.540 oh god I forget one of the Cambridge

00:54:53.820 spies you know

00:54:54.920 he was the head of

00:54:56.420 he was the head of MI5 for

00:54:59.460 for

00:55:00.640 years and did untold damage

00:55:03.720 sent

00:55:04.040 thousands of people to

00:55:07.020 hundreds of agents to be

00:55:09.020 tortured to death

00:55:11.200 knowingly

00:55:12.400 by putting them on missions and then

00:55:15.580 telling the Russians they were coming and stuff like this

00:55:17.660 And then after that, there was a few years where MI5 simply didn't know who to trust.

00:55:25.100 And they were totally paranoid and kind of fighting amongst themselves and blah, blah, blah, blah.

00:55:30.100 Now, I know this is a very roundabout way of getting here, but you read a John le Carré novel.

00:55:36.100 It's so complicated and so hard to take in.

00:55:38.040 It's all about that kind of spirit and that time.

00:55:41.320 But it does nothing compared to the internet.

00:55:43.400 The internet is a hall of mirrors, you know, and we have no idea who we're talking to.

00:55:49.100 We have no idea if we're doing the right thing at any one moment.

00:55:53.000 It's it's it. I think that as a species, we weren't ready for it and we're still not ready and we're still adjusting.

00:56:02.660 You know, I think there have to be lots of conversations about the effect of porn on kids.

00:56:08.920 you know whether porn is making young girls feel feel want to escape their sexuality uh whether

00:56:15.500 it's making young i fuck knows what it's doing to young boys but when you see a 20 year old kid in

00:56:20.740 pigtails you know it's like no no no no no this is something's going wrong something's really

00:56:25.480 gone wrong 20 year old male with pigtails and simpering at the camera and you know with a

00:56:30.700 patreon link in their in their uh in their thing it's it's there's got to be a conversation about

00:56:36.820 why do you hate progress so much graham why do you hate progress uh listen mate speaking of

00:56:41.600 conversations we'd love to have you back on the show when we can do it in studio and we can

00:56:45.540 continue because we've run out of time oh okay no i'm happy to talk anytime and uh yeah it's an

00:56:51.360 interesting subject all this isn't it it is no we'd love to come we'd love to have you back uh

00:56:56.720 when we can sit down and talk face to face i think that would be great but thank you very much for

00:57:00.500 coming on and uh we just got one more question for you mate oh yeah and the question always is

00:57:06.100 what's the one thing we're not talking about as a society that we really should be oh god okay um

00:57:12.540 oh i know uh trans rights

00:57:15.520 perfect well uh if uh if people want to follow you your twitter remind everybody what your twitter

00:57:25.080 is if they want to check out uh your work and activism i suppose it would be the right way of

00:57:30.380 describing it is glinner yep it's glinner add glinner we'll make sure to put it in the video

00:57:35.480 thanks for coming on and we'll see

00:57:37.660 all of you who've been watching very soon

00:57:39.900 and we'll see Graham

00:57:41.820 very soon for another interview when we can do it

00:57:43.660 face to face

00:57:44.180 Absolutely, I'll be honest with you Graham

00:57:47.760 I can't wait for the Father Ted musical

00:57:49.540 it's going to be blinding

00:57:50.600 The songs are amazing so far

00:57:52.820 and I think we really nailed it

00:57:55.660 it's very funny I think

00:57:57.460 we did lose one joke the other day

00:58:00.160 where Dougal says

00:58:01.280 someone calls Dougal stupid

00:58:03.940 and he says

00:58:04.400 I'll never be Albert Epstein

00:58:05.760 that's for sure

00:58:06.600 we lost that one

00:58:11.620 that's brilliant

00:58:12.680 alright well

00:58:13.580 thanks very much

00:58:14.420 Graham

00:58:14.940 thanks for talking to me

00:58:16.200 thanks mate

00:58:33.940 Thank you.

TRIGGERnometry - May 13, 2020

Graham Linehan：＂I Will Not Bow to Bullies＂

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