Western Standard - Comedian Ben Bankas gets cancelled by the ‘Gay Eagle’

00:00:00.000 G'day, I'm Derek Fildebrandt, publisher of the Western Standard.

00:00:14.880 I've got a very special guest in today.

00:00:17.940 Ben Bankus is a Canadian comedian, originally from Toronto.

00:00:23.960 You wouldn't know that by the kind of jokes he tells, but he lives in Austin, Texas now.

00:00:29.520 but he's been touring his way

00:00:31.820 through Canada. He came through

00:00:33.600 Calgary just this weekend. Myself and a

00:00:35.720 bunch of the staff at the Western Standard

00:00:37.720 Newsroom went down to

00:00:39.700 see him

00:00:40.420 and boy, he didn't

00:00:43.640 disappoint.

00:00:46.820 Ben,

00:00:47.600 thanks so much for joining. I appreciate it.

00:00:49.780 Thank you for having me here.

00:00:51.720 It's a beautiful, beautiful office.

00:00:53.840 I like that you have CBC going in the background.

00:00:56.000 That's opposition research.

00:00:57.400 You gotta understand your enemy.

00:00:59.520 that's true yeah do they watch you guys uh yeah yeah we uh we've gotten um it's funny they uh

00:01:07.020 every they kind of stopped for the last maybe two years but uh i declared um everything they do is

00:01:13.580 public property so when they take a photo like we can use it on our stuff because i paid for it as

00:01:17.840 a taxpayer and every once in a while they'd send uh some dipshit lawyer would send me something

00:01:22.800 saying that's our copyright and i'd say uh yeah you owe me money and well so uh they they watch

00:01:30.480 us and they like you know they'll harass from time to time but uh yeah they just wish that they there

00:01:36.160 was no that you didn't exist though which is crazy right yeah well thankfully they pretty much don't

00:01:40.960 exist i mean they're black hole taxpayers money but no one's really watching them yeah and the

00:01:46.560 old people in the seniors homes that they that's about it yeah you know they switch between matlock

00:01:51.280 They, like, force them to vote

00:01:53.340 somehow. I don't know how they do it.

00:01:54.900 They, like, show up and take them downstairs

00:01:57.280 and force them to vote

00:01:59.260 NDP or whatever they do. Between Jell-O,

00:02:01.300 yeah. Yeah.

00:02:02.260 I don't know. It somehow works.

00:02:06.120 So, look, I've

00:02:07.880 been a fan for a while.

00:02:10.240 You know, I was telling you before we came

00:02:11.320 on air, you know, me and colleagues would send each

00:02:13.260 other reels, some of your spicier content,

00:02:15.820 and, you know, we

00:02:17.240 saw you were coming to concrete, and I was like,

00:02:19.500 buy, like, ten seats, we're

00:02:21.140 taking some of the newsroom down uh so we we booked and we booked uh if your show with the

00:02:26.460 gray eagle um like day went on sale and then um well that that didn't happen uh got canceled um

00:02:35.080 you ended up playing instead of one big show agree eagle you did uh how many shows are you

00:02:39.440 doing in calgary so uh we're doing like four or something five six seven so seven stand-up shows

00:02:46.280 and then we added a live podcast show so eight shows total is that your uber eats thing you do

00:02:52.440 yeah we yeah we order we order uber eats and we bring the uber eats people on stage and then we

00:02:56.920 surround that spectacle with uh with some other um fun surprises and events and guests but it's

00:03:06.200 look i i the punishment that the gray eagle casino gave me is uh more work more money so

00:03:12.760 So, you know, they they miscalculated and it's clearly because of a look, I get that you're making a joke about indigenous people.

00:03:27.720 They're on indigenous. You can ask the question.

00:03:29.700 Well, you you made a joke. I don't know if it's done on that day, but you posted it on your social media.

00:03:36.020 It was a residential schools joke. You know, like I wish it was a school for that.

00:03:40.060 Maybe we'll insert a little quick clip here.

00:03:43.240 Back from Winnipeg, they have like a, it's like the, it's like an indigenous zombie apocalypse.

00:03:57.160 I was thinking, okay, it'd be nice if there's, you know, some sort of school we could send them to.

00:04:10.060 unfortunately that ship has sailed

00:04:14.480 say what you want about the residential schools

00:04:19.440 but they did, you know, it was nice architecture

00:04:21.820 nice colonial

00:04:25.620 I'm just saying, those schools

00:04:31.100 if you wanted to go to a residential school now in 2025

00:04:33.920 it would be like 40 grand a year

00:04:35.440 this motherfuckers got it for free

00:04:38.740 I mean

00:04:42.260 if I was

00:04:44.100 indigenous

00:04:44.920 I'll probably take a little offense to it

00:04:47.780 but you know, you've got to be able to laugh at yourself

00:04:50.320 and you know, Grey Eagle is

00:04:52.420 practically, it feels like

00:04:54.200 it's in Calgary but it's the way the city's

00:04:56.160 kind of carved with Grey Eagle

00:04:57.840 it's Sutina

00:04:59.740 so yeah, of course

00:05:01.860 of course they took offense

00:05:03.440 it is an offense, you do, I don't think you say anything

00:05:06.040 that's not offensive, that's why it's good comedy

00:05:08.040 but um uh why did you put it out on uh we have a policy in the office people ask do we get

00:05:18.020 national truth and reconciliation day off i have i have a policy you can ask any one of

00:05:21.720 you know a producer here uh if if my employees send me a picture of themselves in tofino on a

00:05:27.820 surfboard with that day's newspaper they get the day off no one's taken me up on it yet but you

00:05:32.220 know national truth and reconciliation that's what trudeau did or something yeah the very first one

00:05:36.440 he declared it a holiday that i was surfing on that holiday um why'd you post it that day i mean

00:05:41.380 that's that's really you know i mean like why not i mean it's a free country is a holiday mean that

00:05:50.060 there's a suspension of free speech and there's a suspension of you know don't make fun of the

00:05:55.980 thing that is most relevant on the day that it's most relevant you got to make fun of it

00:06:00.800 way off in some other time of the year when nobody will ever see it nobody else then nobody

00:06:06.700 will laugh at it it's the canadian mentality of well you know you could have picked another day

00:06:13.320 it's like no actually i picked the perfect day it's like why would you make a joke about christmas

00:06:17.040 on christmas why would you make a joke about hanukkah on hanukkah why would you because that's

00:06:20.700 when it's happening and uh in a free country you should be able to make jokes and critique things

00:06:26.600 and you know people want to say some people are like well he doesn't mean it so it's a joke and

00:06:32.500 other people he means it it's like it really shouldn't matter whether it's really nobody's

00:06:36.880 business what i mean it's the content it's entertainment and people laugh at it and that's

00:06:42.880 the most important part the reason i'm doing it is because i want people to laugh at it and i want

00:06:48.320 people to at the end of the day not take things so seriously because that's good for society it's

00:06:54.440 good for society to not take things so literally and seriously where you see a joke about a day

00:06:59.740 that you think is special and that enrages you to the point where you're sending you know death

00:07:05.740 threats like I got death threats and which is fine like you know I'm not going to be sit here

00:07:10.900 and whine about it and be like I'm a victim but I'm just saying that you know um look it's

00:07:18.000 it's funny everybody got more likes and shares and um and positive comments by you know tenfold

00:07:29.200 or no way more than that than any death threats or negative comments or even the complaint emails

00:07:35.120 that went out to gray eagle was like one or two so yeah what are you gonna do yeah you know uh

00:07:44.400 do i get the gray eagle will be offended or sue tina who owns it yeah no of course it's

00:07:52.020 intentionally offensive which is you know what a lot of comedy is um but i mean you know cancelling

00:07:57.740 it shows a thin skin that you can't take the joke you make it you almost kind of prove the point of

00:08:03.120 the joke when uh when you do that you know if you know people make a joke about albertans we don't

00:08:10.140 uh do the equivalent of quebec and pass some unanimous resolution in the national assembly

00:08:14.160 you got to show you can roll with the punches take the joke and i i don't think it looked very

00:08:19.180 good on green eagle saying you're not allowed to joke about us the national cbc the national

00:08:24.180 what are they a broadcaster i don't know what they are they they are you're telling me that

00:08:30.260 their comedy wing has doesn't make fun of white people but that's okay of course because they're

00:08:36.740 the according to liberals they're the number one according to conservatives we're all equal but

00:08:43.440 According to liberals, whites are number one, and then there's some hierarchy where everybody can make fun of white people because they're on the top, but nobody can make fun of any of the other groups because they're below whites.

00:08:57.100 And I don't think that's fair to other groups, to be honest.

00:09:01.420 I think all groups should be made fun of equally because we should all look at each other as, hey, we're equal, and we are in the same country.

00:09:08.540 We do have this equal opportunity.

00:09:10.300 the whole thing about equity and like where's the starting point and like well his starting point

00:09:15.800 was here and yours was here so you because you have this much money now you need to give him

00:09:20.640 money so it's all bullshit sorry i don't know if i can swear on here you know uh it's all

00:09:25.820 bombs where i think we're good okay uh but um it's bs because that is demoralizing to people

00:09:35.640 who come to this country immigrants that they go oh nobody makes fun of me they can't talk about me

00:09:41.120 because then they feel bad for me because i'm below them and i don't have the same opportunities

00:09:45.880 as them and that's what creates disenfranchisement in my opinion not making fun of each other and

00:09:52.680 having discussions and yeah okay some people hey how could you say that to him another guy from

00:09:56.900 that same group is like actually i thought it was funny and i don't give a shit uh and uh that's

00:10:02.920 that's what you know i'm not necessarily trying to do that but i'm aware of what you know and

00:10:10.820 again if the maybe i'm wrong and maybe it is making everything worse and maybe my comedy is

00:10:15.260 destroying people's lives and and you know what so be it because art doesn't always have to make

00:10:20.780 the world a better place let's be honest i i'd feel left out if people couldn't make fun of white

00:10:25.160 people like i like it for sure i hear you know dave chappelle ripple you know or whoever uh i i

00:10:32.580 would feel excluded if i belong to a group and no one's allowed to make fun of me and it's like

00:10:36.160 you know especially if it's good nature and maybe maybe there is a point to it i mean there's a

00:10:39.840 point to the you know comedy is sometimes you're making a point sometimes there is no point sometimes

00:10:43.840 it is just a laugh but sometimes it's it's a layered laugh because you're exposing kind of a

00:10:48.200 deeper truth by showing the absurd for everyone to see um but you know we're all out of our minds

00:10:55.720 too that people are judging people who are you know we've been doing this for 14 years

00:11:00.380 and started you know i've done comedy in places that are woke you know a million times that's how

00:11:11.240 i mean before woke that there wasn't really woke but one of the places we used to do comedy was

00:11:15.080 like a was like a vapor lounge in in the gay area and there was like it was filled with gay

00:11:21.580 um aids patients that would uh were like dying but they've got they had medical weed licenses

00:11:28.900 before legalization and all that and it was and they were allowed to smoke and for their diseases

00:11:34.520 and stuff that seems like a great place to do a show and that was where it was called village

00:11:38.980 vapor lounge in toronto and and there was this guy named rudiger there and he was i don't know

00:11:44.400 what his real name was but he was called rutiger and he would just he was this bald gay aids

00:11:50.680 patient that was just ruthless like you'd go on stage and he would he would call you

00:11:55.280 you know a f you know the other f word the other f word he'd call you whatever he said he'd say the

00:12:02.120 n word he would he would and he was maybe he was he wasn't black but he wasn't like fully white but

00:12:07.400 he was gay and but it was hilarious and and there was just no and now if that guy that guy doesn't

00:12:15.440 exist anymore those that that kind of vulgarity and you know rudeness is somebody sometimes it's

00:12:22.500 funny to be rude and this is what people don't who get mad at my comedy they go how could he say

00:12:27.460 that it's like well because people are laughing if they weren't laughing i wouldn't say it

00:12:30.840 I'm trying to it's the it's comedy at the end of the day um have you ever heard brocket 99

00:12:38.120 no it's an alberta thing okay all right I I was thinking uh and without getting too much into it

00:12:45.680 uh you're gonna need to go onto youtube and find this thing we came out the 80s for social media

00:12:50.420 but we kind of became this underground thing some guy uh like broken I think to a radio station I

00:12:56.360 don't think I'm not telling this wrong you'd like it was like in Lethbridge on the near the

00:12:59.800 rocket reserve and uh it he had like kind of an hour and a half or something kind of fake radio

00:13:05.060 program with fake commercials and it was kind of it was like you know rocket 99 rock on the

00:13:10.220 reservation you ask any albertan or they're gonna know what that is and it kind of went viral with

00:13:15.060 cassette tapes people would copy these cassette tapes before you could send them like a you know

00:13:19.700 some you know rumble link and um it was a lot of the same kind of thing and there was a lot of

00:13:27.520 great offense to it. The guy

00:13:29.020 whose identity is still kind of, everyone

00:13:31.380 knows who he is, but it's not that proven who he was, but

00:13:33.460 you know, I've seen

00:13:35.520 there was a documentary done about it, and

00:13:37.600 most of the people who took

00:13:39.400 great offense to it were white

00:13:41.500 liberal women. It talked to natives.

00:13:44.100 Some of them, some of them would

00:13:45.480 be offended, and others were like,

00:13:48.480 they got us!

00:13:49.320 It was great! It was funny, and

00:13:51.060 some of it hit a little close to home

00:13:53.460 because we got some issues, but

00:13:54.940 it was funny, and they got it.

00:13:57.520 um you know do you did you get that much after you know uh you know great eagle freaks out and

00:14:03.120 stuff did you have any uh you know like native people reach out to you be like actually no that

00:14:08.480 was bullshits be playing or yeah no point there was there was like way more native people messaging

00:14:17.040 me with like death threats and um basically telling me that you know how dare you do this

00:14:23.360 and if you ever, you know, death threats and then almost death threats

00:14:28.060 and then hinting at a death threat.

00:14:30.660 And then I had, like, two or three that were, like, I thought it was funny.

00:14:34.040 But the majority were very outraged and, like, whatever,

00:14:38.500 and you need to be canceled from all – like, and it's –

00:14:42.380 if you have nothing better going on in your day than to be mad at a Facebook reel

00:14:46.920 at 1 p.m. on a, you know, Tuesday afternoon, like, you have lost your mind.

00:14:53.360 essentially. And, you know, you can blame me, but it's like, that's my job. I'm putting out

00:14:58.560 content. You can react to it however you want. And I understand that the consequences of, you know,

00:15:03.760 putting out something that people are going to react a certain way. But it's like, at the end

00:15:07.880 of the day, it's their loss for reacting that way. It's not my loss. Because really, it just

00:15:12.840 amplifies what's going on. The video gets shared a ton. Yeah, a lot of people are mad. And then

00:15:18.240 other people, including Indigenous people, but a lot of Native people are probably afraid to say,

00:15:23.060 hey i think it's funny and who gives a shit and you know um so yeah i i i don't blame the people

00:15:33.420 who are getting really mad they're obviously in bad places in their lives you know it's it's but

00:15:39.200 the the bigger reason is why are they in bad places in their lives why is canada in such a

00:15:43.020 bad place so many people are so depressed um and and a lot of those people choose instead of going

00:15:48.860 to work instead of creating a business and building something and and growing and trying

00:15:54.960 to reach for the stars they decide that they're going to go protest every day of the week and

00:16:00.760 be an online protester an online warrior bs and that that's and then and then they blame everybody

00:16:11.280 else and it's like guys even even the worst countries in the world have people who are

00:16:18.320 successful out of them so we're not that bad you can you can you can you can pull yourself up from

00:16:25.300 your bootstraps you don't need the government to help you and if you do i mean if you look if you

00:16:29.760 have a disability all these you know i get it but like if you're just an able-bodied person that's

00:16:35.440 even just a high school education maybe even not even a high school education you could probably

00:16:40.600 start a pool cleaning business or

00:16:42.740 something. I mean, get it together,

00:16:45.200 folks. Yeah, and there was

00:16:46.780 like one, two, or three

00:16:48.780 complaints to Grey Eagle.

00:16:50.620 Around the news, we were actually kind of

00:16:52.160 complaining, what are the chances that Ben actually

00:16:54.520 complained on himself?

00:16:57.580 We were joking that

00:16:58.640 Yuck Yucks complained.

00:17:03.020 That's

00:17:03.460 a shrewd business strategy there.

00:17:07.620 You first came to my

00:17:08.940 attention during COVID.

00:17:09.840 it you know you're fairly early on kind of calling out a lot of the absurdity of things uh you know

00:17:15.080 your routine now is you know pretty heavy on immigration and cultural issues um you know

00:17:22.860 routines change over time you said you've been doing this for 14 years you know you can't be

00:17:26.620 doing the same routine for 14 years but people do well okay you can't do it and be successful

00:17:32.420 yeah no yeah that's that's true you know everyone's got kind of the things to kind of come back to but

00:17:37.180 You can do it and be unsuccessful, for sure.

00:17:39.200 Yeah.

00:17:39.420 It's easy.

00:17:41.120 You know, so I wouldn't say why, you know, of course it has changed.

00:17:45.300 If I'm going to talk about maybe, you know, why it's changed and you're able to lean so heavily into such a,

00:17:49.580 well, it wasn't until very recently such a taboo topic, especially in Canada.

00:17:53.320 Like, the immigration debate wasn't, we didn't really have one until like two, three years ago.

00:17:58.640 Like, it was a pretty broad consensus.

00:18:00.540 The only people who were really angry about it were kind of relegated to the cranky margins.

00:18:03.860 now it's like you know i was in the club saturday and you know people

00:18:09.860 what are you gonna say say it i mean you called everyone a racist that they cheered

00:18:17.360 because it was funny people are um you know people are kind of just so like something's

00:18:23.840 changed there's been a vibe shift um you know the immigration debate's been a thing in europe

00:18:28.340 for a long time it's been a thing in the united states for a long time it has not been a thing

00:18:33.500 in canada until extremely recently um and you you were saying shit that a white guy could not say

00:18:40.400 on stage two years ago and not get canceled even from a pretty open place or at least not be

00:18:45.640 successful doing it like what's changed i mean i was saying similar stuff three years ago i just

00:18:52.960 um you know i i first of all i i mean i don't i'm not racist like i don't where's the camera

00:19:00.060 i am not racist but i am

00:19:05.640 i am i'm something i don't know what it is but it's it's maybe i'm culturist i think i'm

00:19:14.600 culturist i don't know when people are like you know like i people i don't i don't really care

00:19:20.600 what you're like i don't see skin color and immediately judge someone but i do see an outfit

00:19:26.500 and immediately judge someone just you know what i'm saying like you could be any skin color if

00:19:31.340 you're wearing your outfit i'm pretty i'm not worried uh i just went to oktoberfest like a

00:19:36.640 week ago you hit you you see like a white guy wearing lederhosen you could judge him and say

00:19:41.600 he's drunk like that and that's a fair judgment it's just i judge people on the outfits and uh

00:19:47.420 and the you know also if you're trying to speak english and if i if i pass like an immigrant

00:19:53.980 family and i can hear them talking to their kids in english even if it sounds not perfect that kind

00:20:00.000 of like fills me with pride of like they're trying and and i and that's great i don't i'm not you

00:20:07.220 know it's like when a fat guy goes to the gym you know you're like look he's he's working on it

00:20:12.940 but it's it's when it just becomes um like certain things and i don't know tell me if i'm wrong and

00:20:19.960 Maybe I'm a bad person for this.

00:20:21.640 But, like, checking into Air Canada and the people working there start talking to each other behind the desk in another language that I don't understand.

00:20:29.020 But if it was Air India and they were speaking that language, I don't know what language they speak.

00:20:34.580 They have, like, ten.

00:20:35.120 French.

00:20:35.740 French.

00:20:39.480 No, they were speaking.

00:20:40.500 I asked them.

00:20:41.260 I go, what language are you speaking?

00:20:43.040 And they go, Punjab or Punjabi.

00:20:45.560 And I was like, I didn't say anything.

00:20:47.340 But I just, in my head, I'm like...

00:20:49.960 why? You speak English.

00:20:51.900 Both of you speak English.

00:20:54.020 You're hiding something from me, the

00:20:55.780 customer? I don't know.

00:20:58.020 Is that racist?

00:20:59.680 Somebody answer this question.

00:21:02.000 I don't even know what you asked me, but

00:21:03.880 I don't have a tangent there.

00:21:05.080 Well, it was a good tangent.

00:21:07.800 The question was like,

00:21:08.900 what's making the vibe?

00:21:10.920 The vibe shift?

00:21:12.280 There weren't as many

00:21:15.220 immigrants before, and

00:21:16.360 now there's this shift to

00:21:19.340 like let them do and have their complete own societies within canada i think people that

00:21:26.540 bothers people um and i don't think it's all of them and i also don't think it's their fault

00:21:30.620 it's it's actually not the immigrants fault it's not the official government policy it's not our

00:21:35.980 fault it's not the indigenous people's fault like for their issues all of the issues of the

00:21:40.300 government and the government's the one over extending the immigration system and they know

00:21:48.660 they're doing this and they're but like the immigrants are standing here and we're going

00:21:55.320 what the hell is this guy doing here and they're like i don't know what i'm doing here i was brought

00:21:59.000 here basically by canada which is terrifying yeah and that's why it's so the question is why is it

00:22:07.740 okay a little bit more because people are a little more fed up i mean of course trump is in office

00:22:12.200 now when biden was in office maybe it was harder to get away with stuff but i was still putting

00:22:16.680 out specials talking about all this stuff and that's how i built my following and continue to

00:22:23.560 build it but at the end of the day like i'm not trying to do anything other than give people some

00:22:30.340 relief to the things that i that bother me because people will be like you you are you catering to

00:22:35.900 your crowd because you it's like no i'm i'm looking at my phone going jeez and then i write

00:22:41.560 something down and then i say it to them they go i saw the same thing i was that's how i felt today

00:22:45.420 so

00:22:46.480 I think it's going to continue

00:22:50.680 to get more and more open

00:22:52.740 and I think it's going to be good for society

00:22:54.420 and I think eventually

00:22:55.520 Hollywood's going to catch up and become

00:22:58.520 more offensive again

00:23:00.680 and cater to

00:23:02.580 the majority instead of catering to

00:23:04.520 the minority which is

00:23:06.240 look

00:23:07.200 why should

00:23:09.840 mainstream

00:23:10.760 entertainment cater to a

00:23:13.780 minority of people

00:23:15.420 they're doing that and they're losing money and they've realized this and

00:23:19.820 they're like,

00:23:20.240 there's no point.

00:23:22.040 I mean,

00:23:22.640 Rogan's the biggest podcast,

00:23:24.180 the comedians that are doing the,

00:23:26.940 that are the most well-known right now are not necessarily the,

00:23:31.760 the ones with the,

00:23:34.360 the right opinions,

00:23:36.200 you know?

00:23:36.860 Yeah.

00:23:37.140 Or the left opinions,

00:23:38.100 whatever.

00:23:38.520 You know what I mean?

00:23:39.980 So we called it the gay Eagle canceled.

00:23:43.420 Yeah.

00:23:43.540 um um you know again i like the place actually pretty well run uh i generally like going to

00:23:51.820 events there but uh you know i thought it looked pretty thin skinned to do um where are you more

00:23:58.860 likely you know yuck yucks uh i don't think they've got a reputation for canceling i think

00:24:03.340 they like they're considered pretty solid like you could be pretty damn defensive at a yuck yucks

00:24:09.300 but uh bigger venues you know because they tend to be you know like where we were

00:24:12.500 southeast corner downtown here um where are you most likely to get canceled when you book a place

00:24:19.420 or do you actually not normally just right get a campaign no your your book had been bank as he's

00:24:24.960 gonna say some shit they already know that first well that's the issue is that the the

00:24:29.800 you know it's it's more of i mean the so the question is where do i what am i worried about

00:24:38.120 kind of thing? I don't think you're

00:24:40.120 very worried. Or where am I worried

00:24:42.000 to get canceled?

00:24:42.700 How often are you getting

00:24:46.160 canceled? Or did they just kind of baked

00:24:48.100 into the wrist? Like their book had been bankers, they

00:24:50.040 know you're going to be extremely offensive

00:24:52.180 to some people.

00:24:54.300 It's like a cost-benefit analysis

00:24:56.060 for them.

00:24:57.780 If you're a government

00:25:00.080 funded venue,

00:25:03.100 which Gray Eagle

00:25:04.160 is government subsidized

00:25:06.580 casino, correct?

00:25:08.120 How does it work?

00:25:09.420 If you consider reserves to be an order of government,

00:25:12.040 kind of outside of municipal, federal,

00:25:13.860 I mean, it's indirectly government,

00:25:15.960 but it's reserved, so it's

00:25:17.400 an ambiguous status. But who built it?

00:25:21.280 You know what I'm saying?

00:25:22.340 I'm not sure. I mean, it's owned

00:25:23.720 by Sutina.

00:25:27.420 They're

00:25:27.860 actually one of the much more commercially successful

00:25:29.940 bands around. They've actually

00:25:31.260 been successful in some of the business dealings.

00:25:35.540 And I have nothing against them, really,

00:25:37.620 other than you know come on guys what are you doing what are you we're trying to do business

00:25:43.240 or we're not and if there's a if that should be written in the contract do not make fun of

00:25:48.700 indigenous don't post any indigenous clips don't make don't mention us um

00:25:54.880 they you know i'm gonna get i i don't get canceled that much and it becomes a cost benefit thing

00:26:01.360 where if a venue knows hey we're gonna sell this out or it's all right which they were all we were

00:26:06.620 almost we were on track to sell out like we would have sold out yeah and if they're going to sell

00:26:13.520 out then the venue gets a couple two complaints they're going to be like who cares let's just do

00:26:17.540 it but if they're government funded and they're incentivized by them or something and there's

00:26:25.940 some sort of pressure um you know but at the end of the day it's quasi government it wasn't like

00:26:31.660 equipment of like a i'm not saying them i'm not saying them i'm saying i'm saying any venue that's

00:26:37.100 owned or funded by the government has the potential to do that if it's a private venue

00:26:43.180 and they don't care then it won't happen um but it you know if it does then it's just

00:26:51.820 just we end up doing a million shows at yuck yucks making more money and so it's

00:26:59.340 you know it's it's up to them do you want to cancel blow me up everybody wants a ticket now

00:27:08.480 you can make no money from this at all and then i make more than i was going to make here because

00:27:16.960 now i'm um you know it you know it's when it's a bigger venue there's a different you know it's

00:27:22.540 expensive right to pay all the the union workers to to wander around and find people seats with a

00:27:31.080 little tiny flashlight it's really they i'm serious though they are all all the you all the people who

00:27:36.800 work at the venues in canada i'm not talking about casinos i'm talking about like theater halls and

00:27:42.760 stuff like that yeah they're their unit yeah so it's you actually make more money if you do it in

00:27:50.300 a smaller venue more it you know so it's 2300 people divided by 230 um is that the right math

00:27:59.820 maybe 200 you know what i'm saying yeah right the size the size of yuck yucks yeah 230 cost you

00:28:05.720 got a you know more hotels you're spending a couple days in calgary yeah i thought about

00:28:09.460 no that's true that is true but i mean it's still not even it takes more time to do a bunch of

00:28:15.280 smaller shows it's more time the biggest loss is that from the gray eagle is that i got less time

00:28:22.380 with my family you know yeah especially around halloween i want to be hanging out with my kids

00:28:27.340 and i don't you know you're great i'm happy i'm here but uh you know i so that they took that for

00:28:34.220 me but they also were daddy's gonna be buying some uh better christmas presents uh you live

00:28:41.280 in austin is it just a nice warmer place to go or uh like how you're you're toronto boy originally

00:28:47.980 um how come you live down in austin um the comedy scene really a lot of the scene moved there

00:28:57.320 during covid i went to during covid and can't when it was locked down i went to austin

00:29:04.480 just to see what was going on and it was everything was open comedy clubs were all open

00:29:10.400 everybody was having a good time everybody's partying yeah you know it got a little sick

00:29:15.500 but uh i think i got a couple fevers but nothing you know nothing a couple ivermectins couldn't

00:29:24.660 handle you know um so but i went there and then for a week in 2020 just to check it out and then

00:29:33.240 i came back here and it was like you know excited to keep building my my stuff here

00:29:41.160 and then i did this and then i went there for a few months uh and at that point like rogan had

00:29:49.240 already moved there mothership comedy mothership was being built a lot of comics had started moving

00:29:56.440 there and the vulcan vulcan gas company is another comedy venue it's also a music venue and dance

00:30:05.480 venue but that's where they were doing kill tony for the longest time in austin so of course tony

00:30:11.500 hinchcock moved there so i was you know it's it's kind of the place to be for comedy it really is

00:30:17.340 the comedy mothership is the best comedy club for to be it to be your home club is like it's great

00:30:25.340 you know mothership and vulcan are two different things so before mothership was built the vulcan

00:30:31.760 was where rogan did his shows where tony did his shows and they had a lot of big headliners coming

00:30:37.940 through they still do but then mothership opened and now both clubs work you know or

00:30:45.280 mothership's more full

00:30:47.420 sometimes, but Vulcan is a very

00:30:49.520 fun venue, and I really love

00:30:51.080 performing at Vulcan, too.

00:30:53.260 I know, it's just not, you know,

00:30:55.740 they put, I don't know how much, millions

00:30:57.440 of dollars they put into mothership, but it's

00:30:59.400 quite state-of-the-art.

00:31:01.640 On your show Saturday,

00:31:03.520 towards the end, you asked, has anyone ever seen

00:31:05.440 Aliens? I remember one guy popped up,

00:31:07.320 he says, I've seen it, he asked where he's from,

00:31:09.280 he said, he's from Vulcan. Vulcan is a

00:31:11.260 little, it's a very

00:31:13.300 small town, south of Calgary,

00:31:14.780 and it's kind of Star Trek themed

00:31:17.700 Vulcans and there's like Enterprise

00:31:19.380 and stuff. It's crazy

00:31:21.460 kitschy. But yeah, I remember this

00:31:23.620 guy. The guy's like, yeah, I saw

00:31:25.840 it laying on a rock pile in Vulcan.

00:31:27.680 It just sounded like he was totally stoned

00:31:29.640 at that moment. I'm like, of course that guy's

00:31:31.400 from Vulcan. That's hilarious.

00:31:33.140 You gotta check out Vulcan.

00:31:35.120 But Austin is the best

00:31:36.700 if you're traveling a lot, it's one of

00:31:39.620 the best airports because it's in the middle of everything.

00:31:42.580 New York this way,

00:31:43.900 la this way it's almost even distance between the two and then if you know i'm flying all over the

00:31:50.560 states it's nice to be in the middle all right so well uh during covid you know you you took it on

00:31:57.580 uh i mean there was always kind of a a vocal dissident group against it you know that's kind

00:32:02.480 of how you know that's kind of when we came of age as a publication taking on mainstream narrative

00:32:07.160 on you know or the government's narrative on covid um you know you were taking that down but

00:32:13.320 it was kind of a taboo.

00:32:15.980 We're all in this together, and you're

00:32:17.580 just kind of mercilessly slicing and dicing

00:32:19.660 them. You have taken on

00:32:21.740 the taboo in a very aggressive

00:32:23.580 way around mass migration

00:32:25.460 in Canada, in the States, wherever you go.

00:32:28.940 I don't know if there's

00:32:29.700 a way to... I don't know how to put this, but what do you think

00:32:31.660 is the next big taboo?

00:32:33.660 What are you going to be talking about in two

00:32:35.700 years? What's going to be the next sacred

00:32:37.820 cow that you're not allowed to touch

00:32:39.840 right now, but

00:32:41.740 that you know you might be kind of you know battering the gates of in two years probably

00:32:47.240 digital id and social credit systems that they want to implement and the bills these new bill

00:32:55.620 c8 and c9 and in canada and the u.s not so much but the bigger fear is so what there's only three

00:33:04.640 years left of trump two years left almost two and a half so once that if if the republicans don't

00:33:12.320 stay in you're gonna see in my opinion i could be wrong but i think the democrats would get in and

00:33:18.720 they would push for digital id in the u.s and social credit systems in the u.s similar to what

00:33:24.940 they have in the uk and then if they do that canada will 100 do that and it will further

00:33:31.120 restrict free speech and though that's kind of the i think that's kind of the covet of tomorrow

00:33:37.760 the covet of right now is the uh it's not really even massive i mean it's it's unfettered

00:33:44.480 immigration the fact that it's people coming i made a joke about it but i'll tell it that

00:33:49.840 um you know it used to be you'd get a cab driver you'd be like what did you do in your old old

00:33:54.960 country they'd be like uh i was a doctor i was a lawyer i was an engineer now you get in an uber

00:34:01.200 you go what did you do in india and the guy goes uber he's like oh you're overqualified for this

00:34:07.300 stuff yeah so but the point is that and and is that ruthless is that well who you know the left

00:34:14.620 could say well why you know we're helping people who are underprivileged that don't have that type

00:34:19.940 of education so that what that's no are we we should be trying to make the country better

00:34:27.140 and i saw this video and i'm sure you've seen it with the the glass marble like the marble video

00:34:34.080 where the guy talks about how many people there are in the world yeah and like how many a million

00:34:38.880 each marble contains a million people and there's like 750 million marbles or whatever i don't know

00:34:47.120 whatever but he pulls it out and he's like here's a million people this is our immigration every

00:34:52.260 year and he's shown with all the other marbles like we're not helping plus there's and every

00:34:56.520 year there's these these marbles are growing by whatever crazy amount right because they're

00:35:02.480 having tons of kids over in the countries that we're bringing people from so um he basically

00:35:10.220 explains it it's impossible like we can't we even if we did the max immigration forever we'd never

00:35:15.800 be able to help the majority of people ever so if with that being said what's the why we should just

00:35:22.580 be making our countries as good as possible because at the end of the day the stronger the

00:35:26.500 western countries are and the richer the western countries are and the more educated the western

00:35:32.380 countries are the more we can help the people who are in those countries without actually bringing

00:35:37.960 them here which isn't necessarily going to help them no it's potentially going to ruin their lives

00:35:43.440 and make them come here and spend their whole life doing uber and or not even be able to afford to

00:35:49.780 live here and have to go back and that's that's worse than us focusing on being a great nation

00:35:56.740 that can help developing countries properly not right now we're doing all the weird you know

00:36:03.840 two seven million dollars for you know trans nigerian farmers that you know or what you know

00:36:09.600 all those things that we're doing that are like

00:36:11.540 the USAID. We just never

00:36:13.480 stopped. Why can't we just do that for

00:36:15.540 something? How about $7 million for

00:36:17.620 this specific village

00:36:19.800 to make it public transit?

00:36:21.760 Something... Water running

00:36:23.760 on a reserve here. Well, yeah.

00:36:25.800 I mean, they're drinking something, but...

00:36:30.520 I'm gonna get

00:36:31.840 canceled now.

00:36:34.580 Gatorade.

00:36:35.800 Get them some Gatorade zeros.

00:36:39.600 okay

00:36:40.880 no

00:36:41.900 where are you at it next

00:36:45.420 I guess you're probably done with your Calgary

00:36:47.440 ones now or

00:36:48.200 if you're listening from Canada I have a huge Canadian tour

00:36:51.380 that we're going to be announcing

00:36:52.280 probably about two or three weeks

00:36:55.440 and that's going to be for 2026

00:36:57.640 you're coming back to Calgary then

00:36:59.180 potentially

00:37:00.380 Edmonton people really want me in Edmonton

00:37:03.460 but

00:37:05.560 where am I going after this

00:37:07.600 I'm going to Toledo Ohio

00:37:10.280 Houston, Texas, Pottstown, Pennsylvania, Atlantic City, New Jersey, New York City,

00:37:18.780 which is sold out.

00:37:19.920 A lot of these shows are sold out.

00:37:21.300 Toronto sold out, so I'll be back in Toronto.

00:37:24.000 And then Montreal in December.

00:37:26.100 And after that, I'm going back to New York and going to D.C., Washington, D.C.,

00:37:34.580 and then we're going to be announcing a whole bunch of new shows.

00:37:37.820 I'm doing a casino.

00:37:38.860 know i'm doing another casino in uh in america you don't learn you don't learn in america though

00:37:44.100 so it's uh it's cool it's called parks and it's it's near philadelphia so come out to that that's

00:37:49.620 i think that's on my site also and i just put out a comedy special it's called invasion it's on

00:37:54.160 youtube youtube.com slash ben bank is comedy or go to ben bank is.com and click the specials link

00:38:00.520 or ben banks.com slash specials and my podcast bank is podcast is out every week for free on

00:38:07.020 YouTube, and you can support on Patreon,

00:38:09.060 patreon.com slash BenBankus, and you can watch

00:38:10.940 the bonus episodes.

00:38:12.660 Well, it's been a slice. Love your

00:38:15.000 show in town. I hope you come back to Calgary soon.

00:38:17.200 Poor folks at Edmonton definitely

00:38:18.840 need to get a slice of it.

00:38:22.260 So, can't wait

00:38:22.960 until you're back, and good luck with the rest of your tour.

00:38:24.780 Cool. Thank you, man. Thank you so much, bro.

00:38:26.640 Thank you. Alright, thank you.

00:38:28.900 That's Ben Bankus.

00:38:31.900 Probably

00:38:32.260 gotta be one of the biggest

00:38:34.400 comedians in Canada right now, if not already.

00:38:37.020 the biggest

00:38:38.220 check out

00:38:40.660 his stuff on the sites he's just mentioned

00:38:43.400 if you're

00:38:44.140 got dates ahead, definitely book

00:38:47.120 go into a show, I brought a bunch of the Western Standard Newsroom

00:38:49.480 and we pissed ourselves

00:38:51.580 it was great

00:38:52.240 thank you very much for joining us today, God bless

Western Standard - October 28, 2025

Comedian Ben Bankas gets cancelled by the ‘Gay Eagle’

Episode Stats

Length

Words per Minute

Word Count

Sentence Count

Misogynist Sentences

Hate Speech Sentences

Summary

Transcript