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Nov. 23, 2015 - The Joe Rogan Experience
01:35:55
Joe Rogan Experience #726 - Josh Zepps
Participants
Main voices
j
joe rogan
45:40
j
josh szeps
48:28
Appearances
Clips
j
jamie vernon
00:13
t
tj kirk
00:02
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Speaker Time Text
joe rogan
And we're live, Josh Zeps.
josh szeps
I didn't even notice.
And then I took a sip of coffee, and then my mouth was full of coffee.
joe rogan
Perfect timing.
josh szeps
I didn't even realize.
joe rogan
It's alright, dude.
josh szeps
Should have had a countdown to five or something instead of three.
joe rogan
Well, Jamie was doing this thing with his fingers.
josh szeps
Yeah, I saw him over there at the periphery of the corner of my eye, and I wasn't sure what he was doing.
Was it a countdown?
Was it a wave?
joe rogan
Gang signs.
josh szeps
Gang signs.
joe rogan
That's his gang.
josh szeps
Fucking Jamie.
joe rogan
He's in the JRE gang.
He throws up the three, two, one.
josh szeps
Will you teach me after the show, Jamie, some of the signs?
unidentified
Shh.
joe rogan
After the show.
You can't even talk about it, dude.
Sorry.
unidentified
Keep it on the DL. First rule of JRE gang.
josh szeps
You don't talk about JRE gang.
joe rogan
Dude, it's the perfect time to have you in because the fucking world is literally about to go crazy.
josh szeps
What's going on?
About to?
I feel like it has!
joe rogan
It's just the bubbling.
We think it has, but here we are in this wonderful office park in the valley in California, and everything's fine.
We go outside, there's birds chirping.
So the whole world hasn't gone crazy.
josh szeps
It's true.
joe rogan
But there's spots that are going fucking crazy.
Yale is going crazy.
You pay attention to that, the student bank.
josh szeps
Absolutely.
I did my whole show about it last week on my new podcast, which we're going to do an episode of after this.
joe rogan
That's right, the new Josh Zeps podcast.
What is it called?
josh szeps
Hashtag WeThePeopleLive.
If you search hashtag WeThePeopleLive, we're so down with the hip social future.
You've got to get with it, Joe.
joe rogan
I do.
Hashtags are something I only use in jest.
josh szeps
Yeah, well, this is sort of in jest.
It's tongue-in-cheek.
It's also a cool way for people to search for you.
There's probably a bazillion WeThePeopleLives podcasts, but there's only one that's going to start with a hashtag.
So you put in a hashtag, and ours will presumably be the first to come up.
joe rogan
I use it for the UFC only, like hashtag UFC 193 if I'm talking about like an event.
josh szeps
Yeah.
joe rogan
I do that.
But hashtags are interesting because if you ever go to hashtags, you ever go to like hashtag black Twitter?
josh szeps
Yeah, I never do it.
Jesus Christ.
It's a scary place.
joe rogan
It's a giant big smile on his face.
That's where he spends 23 hours a day.
josh szeps
Well, you know how sometimes you don't need to go to them because they come to you.
When you say something, then you get taken out of context, then you get picked up by some blog, and then all of a sudden, like over the weekend I've been getting all these...
Tweets just out of the blue about what fascism is.
I was like, who are these people and why are they tweeting at me?
I didn't even know that I said anything about fascism.
Well, it's because Breitbart picked up something that I did on a segment on HuffPost Live last week and wrote something up about it, about how apparently I implied that Donald Trump was a fascist, which I actually didn't mean because I don't think that he is.
And now all of a sudden, I'm in the hashtag.
I'm part of the hashtag about fascism without even choosing it.
joe rogan
I believe that most people who use the term fascist or fascism don't really exactly know what the term means.
josh szeps
I think you're totally right.
joe rogan
So let's help them out right now.
Let's find the official definition of fascism, because I think most people get it wrong.
Fascism means an authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization.
So, people use that, there's other definitions of it, of course, but extreme right-wing, authoritarian, people use that for a lot of, like, non-fascist reasons.
josh szeps
That's true, and I probably used it sloppily myself in the context in which Breitbart was picking me up, and they would have a point if I did come across as saying that Donald Trump was a fascist, but all the people who were tweeting back at me were saying, fascism isn't right-wing, you idiot, it's left-wing!
unidentified
It's left-wing!
josh szeps
Socialism is the real fascism!
You don't even understand the meaning of the word!
So I just responded with a link to the Oxford Dictionary, which also includes the word right-wing in it.
joe rogan
Yeah, it's mostly considered right-wing, but people are using it in the left-wing circles now, or about left-wing circles, because they're using it in the authoritarian context.
That's right.
I think that's applicable, because a lot of what is going on In, like, really extreme social justice left-wing type organizations or groups is that they're trying to control behavior and they're trying to mitigate criticism.
Like, you can't criticize these concepts because these concepts are supported by, you know, social justice.
josh szeps
I've got an interesting study on that that I brought for you, which you're gonna like.
And before I get to it, I don't want to forget what I was just thinking.
When you were talking about how here we are in the valley, birds outside.
unidentified
Chirp, chirp, chirp.
josh szeps
Chirp, chirp, chirp.
Sunshine.
Trees.
That's a very good birdie, Joe.
joe rogan
Thank you.
Practice that all day.
josh szeps
Give us my little one.
I want to hear it again.
I'm going to put that as my ringtone.
joe rogan
Ah, do it, dude.
You'll never hear your phone.
josh szeps
Just put up really, really loud.
So I was in Beirut briefly a few months ago and was standing on the rooftop of this swanky hotel looking out over the Mediterranean and looking out over the houses.
And I was like, this is like an idyllic, beautiful part of the world in terms of its natural beauty.
And I could practically swim from here to the Greek islands, how people are, basically, the refugees.
unidentified
Yeah.
josh szeps
And I had just been in Athens as well, which is like, geographically, physiologically, Italy, Greece are the same as all these fucked up parts of North Africa and Israel and Palestine and Lebanon and not to mention Syria.
And I was, like, just struck by how capable we are of fucking things up as people.
Because the actual geography is the same.
Like, those waves are the same waves as the ones on the Italian Riviera.
But the Italian Riviera is the Italian Riviera, and this shithole is this shithole.
Through no difference of climate or sun, or the birdies are still there, the birdies are the same...
But religion and politics just has an endless capacity to screw things up.
joe rogan
You could call it religion or politics, but it's really just power.
It's human beings trying to achieve power.
And you could do it through whatever modality you choose, but the reality is it's just people that are trying to control other people and trying to gain things.
josh szeps
But I think it's in particular tribes trying to control other tribes.
And politics and religion make you much more likely, make it much easier to be tribal, much easier to not be an individual.
joe rogan
Sorry, but isn't the argument against that what we were just talking about in terms of social justice warriors and people calling people fascists?
I mean, you're in a tribe.
If you're on the extreme left or the extreme right, you're in a tribe.
You know, when you talk to right-wing people, they're almost incapable of not bringing up liberals.
Or the liberals think...
They don't just bring up their own concepts and their own thoughts.
They'll immediately disparage liberal ideas.
Like, immediately.
Well, you know, they'll tell you, well, you're a liberal, you know, you believe in this and this and that, so you're a liberal, and they'll, like, immediately, like, downplay your ideas.
That's a tribal thing.
josh szeps
Absolutely.
That's politics.
It's religion.
And social justice warriors will do the same thing.
They'll do the same thing about, I mean, my, you know, the first time I came to your attention was with that interview with Suey Park, the Council Colbert activist, right?
joe rogan
Still one of my favorite.
When you just broke it down to her, you're like, this is so fucking unbelievably stupid.
And you could tell she was just, like, devastated that you even had the balls to question her.
josh szeps
To people who haven't seen it, she wanted to have the Colbert Report cancelled because apparently it was racist, and I did an interview with her on HuffPost Live.
joe rogan
Well, not only that, it was a joke about someone being...
Yeah, it was a satirical joke.
Well, for people who don't even know the show, Colbert plays a character.
He plays an extreme left-wing, kind of goofy character.
Excuse me, scream right-wing, kind of goofy character.
And in that context of that character, he made a joke about racism.
It was a joke about racism.
josh szeps
It was a funny joke, too.
Do you remember what the joke was?
joe rogan
Yeah, I do.
josh szeps
It was Dan Snyder, who's the head of the Redskins, right?
joe rogan
Yes.
josh szeps
who was saying that he, so that he didn't have to change the name of the Redskins because it was racist, he was going to set up a charity for Native American causes.
And Stephen Colbert, in his right-wing persona, said that sometimes he'd been accused of doing jokes that could be considered to be offensive about Asian people.
So in return, he was going to set up the Ching Chong Ding Dong Foundation for sensitivity towards Orientals or whatever.
joe rogan
Or whatever.
And she found that offensive.
Not really.
I don't believe she really did.
I think she found it.
It was a green light for her to attack and to use hashtag activism.
josh szeps
And to get some publicity.
joe rogan
There's a story that's making the rounds today.
A Kansas City University professor who, in a class about racism, a discussion about racism and discrimination, she used the word nigger.
And in using the word, all these students are trying to get her fired.
And she's been removed of her duties right now.
She's been temporarily suspended under review or whatever their process is.
But in just saying the word, not saying someone is like, this is a word that people have issues.
Let's discuss words that people have issues with.
What are the origins of these words?
Why are they problematic?
What is, you know, what can be done about this?
I'm not sure exactly what the context of her class is, but...
josh szeps
I'm sure the context wasn't, let's go around accusing black people of being niggas, right?
joe rogan
Absolutely not.
Absolutely not.
But this is the same kind of thing.
I don't believe anyone in that class was actually hurt by that.
I think they found the green light and they attacked.
josh szeps
Yeah.
Don't we learn what to be offended by?
joe rogan
Yes.
josh szeps
So it's possible that someone felt like an initial kind of reaction of, oh my god, I just heard that word.
joe rogan
That's a good point.
josh szeps
And I've been told that that word is completely unacceptable under all circumstances.
joe rogan
And I've been told that I'm allowed to be offended.
josh szeps
Yeah, that's right.
And indeed ought to be offended.
joe rogan
Yes.
josh szeps
And so, like, I was amazed by the power of that word when I first came to the States.
Because only here do we have this dumbass word, the N-word, like that phrasing.
I mean, I'd never heard that until I came to the States.
In Australia, it was completely unacceptable to ever use the word nigger against somebody.
You would just never do that.
I mean, I was taught since the earliest days that racism is terrible.
But you could talk about it in polite company.
I mean, if it came up, you'd be able to discuss the existence of the word, and nobody would ever say the N-word.
joe rogan
But you guys have racism towards aborigines.
josh szeps
Totally.
joe rogan
That's pretty real over there.
But it's not towards black people, right?
josh szeps
No, that's right.
But there is a much, much, much bigger awareness of the kind of tragedy of the original sin of what happened when Australia was settled than there is here towards Native Americans.
I sort of regard Native Americans as being the people who've really been screwed in this country.
I mean, not that it should be a competition of, like, whose suffering was worse or, like, I'll put my slavery up against your genocide.
joe rogan
Who did the way people fuck over more?
josh szeps
Yeah, exactly.
unidentified
That's right.
josh szeps
That's right, because I always hate it when we get into those games.
but no one even talks about it.
Like in Australia, if you go to an awards ceremony, for example, if you're at the Grammys, every single presenter will come up and they will begin by saying, I want to start by acknowledging the traditional owners of this land, the Yadawundi people.
You know, they'll at least give a kind of politically correct nod to the fact that...
We occupied a country and basically wiped out an entire people.
You'll see Aboriginal flags flying on Parliament House alongside the Australian flag.
I don't even know what the Native American flag is.
Do they even have a flag?
joe rogan
I don't believe they did.
josh szeps
Well, they didn't.
Nor did Aborigines back then.
joe rogan
They had some symbols.
They certainly had symbols that were indicative of different tribes or different regions.
But I don't think they had flags.
I could be wrong.
josh szeps
No, but Aborigines didn't have flags.
Aborigines didn't even have metal.
joe rogan
So, yeah, right?
unidentified
Okay.
josh szeps
I mean, they were at the time when the British settled Australia, and I always get accused when I say things like this of, you know, by politically correct social justice warriors, of imposing onto traditional societies an idea of human civilization as being better if it's, like, industrialized than if it's not industrialized.
Right.
Because I'm, like, a white man who, like, totally thinks that, like, the 21st century is better than the fucking 15th century, which I do.
joe rogan
Well, let me help out, because it is better.
unidentified
Yeah.
joe rogan
We have computers and the internet.
We have books.
We have a lot of things that are better than, like, flint knives.
josh szeps
Having said that, you're such a white man, Joe.
Having said that, if you think about, like, the traditional anthropological conception of human evolution going from, like, the discovery of fire and farming and then up through the Bronze Age and the Iron Age and so on...
Aborigines, when the British settled Australia, were the least advanced civilization in the world by far.
I mean, we're talking...
And again, the politically correct part of me has to keep qualifying.
They had been around for over 100,000 years, so they were doing something successful.
It's only been 2,000 years since Jesus.
Well, that's true.
joe rogan
Rabbits are doing a good job, too.
josh szeps
Joe Rogan, did you just compare Aboriginal Australians to rabbits?
joe rogan
I did.
In that context.
josh szeps
Okay.
I like you for that, because I like analogies, and I like being able to accept analogies without thinking that the person is saying that the two things are the same in every respect.
joe rogan
Yeah.
josh szeps
Because I always get pulled up.
Like, I made a Hitler analogy the other day about...
I was talking to...
Who was it?
Donnie Deutsch?
Do you know that guy?
Yes.
And he was talking about how he likes Trump, and...
And I made some parallel where I was like, he was, I was simply saying that like, he was like, he's popular, he's touching a vein.
I was like, yeah, but is that the only reason to respect somebody?
Hitler touched a vein as well.
And he was like, he got all outraged on the air at the fact that I would like, say Hitler.
He was like, you can't do that.
Like, how dare you?
I'm Jewish.
And I was like, I was not, I'm not saying that Trump is the same as Hitler, you idiot.
I'm saying that.
I'm saying that the criterion by which you were judging his success is flawed, and I was using an analogy to do so.
joe rogan
Well, he should be ashamed, because he's doing the exact thing we're accusing the extreme left of.
He saw a green light, and he went after it.
josh szeps
That's right.
Does he really think I'm a Nazi sympathizer, or that I'm shitting on him?
So then I was like, hey, my grandmother was in the concentration camp, so don't pull a juke out on me.
And then I just moved right on.
joe rogan
Yeah, fuck.
josh szeps
Donnie, how dare you?
Aborigines didn't have metal and stuff.
joe rogan
No, they were extremely primitive.
So far, removed from what we consider to be advanced civilization that Australia felt it was okay to actually take their children and adopt them.
josh szeps
And this was recent.
joe rogan
This was in the 50s.
josh szeps
You know, until 1969, Aborigines were classified in Australia as fauna.
unidentified
Whoa.
josh szeps
In other words, they weren't considered...
joe rogan
Not flora.
josh szeps
There might have been a couple of floral aborigines, but they were mostly in the same category as kangaroos.
That's dark.
You couldn't kill them.
joe rogan
You couldn't?
josh szeps
No.
But, I mean, they weren't officially classified as fauna.
It's just that they weren't classified as human.
Like, they weren't considered to be people in the...
joe rogan
So, like, you can't kill a chimp either.
josh szeps
Yeah.
joe rogan
Wow.
unidentified
Wow.
joe rogan
That's fucked up.
josh szeps
So it's a recent thing, but it's come a long way in the past 15 or 20 years.
Now I think there's a general consensus that we really fucked them over.
joe rogan
I hope so.
You can't steal their fucking babies, no matter how primitive.
josh szeps
Not to defend it, but this was at the same time that Jim Crow was going on here, right?
I mean, it's not like we were enlightened, well, our forefathers were enlightened in the 50s about race.
joe rogan
Yeah, well, everybody was pretty fucked up back then.
I think it's very difficult for us to understand in 2015 what it was like in 1950. Because I think we assume that they should have known better.
They should have been like us.
But a hundred years before them, they were cowboys.
They had horses and trains, and that's it.
And a hundred years before that, they didn't even have fucking trains.
And a hundred years before that, you're in the dark ages.
I mean, the 1500s, 1400s, you're a few hundred years removed from Genghis Khan.
josh szeps
It's so fast, isn't it?
Yeah, so fast.
I don't remember whether I've spoken to you about this before, but when I was in Greece on the trip that I was just talking about, I was standing at the Acropolis, and I was expecting to be wowed like all tourists are by, oh, the sheer age of this thing.
Oh, I'm at the birthplace of Western civilization.
And instead, what I thought was, I'd actually just been back to New Zealand because my grandma died.
She was one day shy of her 100th birthday.
joe rogan
Damn, almost made it.
josh szeps
99 and 364 days.
joe rogan
So if she was just born premature, she would have had that day.
You know?
I mean, when you were born, it's so arbitrary.
They induce labor.
josh szeps
Yeah, that's a good way of thinking about it.
If you take her from, like, the third trimester, she made it.
joe rogan
She made it.
josh szeps
From the quickening.
joe rogan
Yes.
josh szeps
She made it.
Her soul made it.
joe rogan
Yeah, 100%.
josh szeps
And what I was struck by at the Acropolis and the Parthenon was not like how old human civilization was, but was like...
My grandma, her lifetime is a manageable period of time in my brain.
I can think about that in a way that when you talk to me about something that happened 50,000 years ago, it's just meaningless.
And when you talk about the size of the cosmos or a light year or something, I might be able to understand it intellectually, but it just washes over my head.
I don't know what you're talking about.
But the lifetime of my grandmother, that's a manageable span of time.
I can imagine her life.
joe rogan
100 years, yes.
josh szeps
And you know what?
This Acropolis, at the dawn of Western civilization, before humans had even invented anything that we would recognize as being civilized in terms of laws and procedures and technologies, that's only 100 of my grandmas.
joe rogan
Yeah.
Yeah.
How about this?
josh szeps
Or less.
No, sorry.
It's like 4,000 years.
It's 40 of my grandmas.
Jesus was 20 of my grandmas.
joe rogan
Yeah.
josh szeps
A nuclear weapon.
My grandma was born during the Gallipoli campaign in World War I. Hitler wasn't even a name that her parents knew when she was born.
The Depression hadn't happened.
The bomb hadn't been invented, let alone computers.
How fast are things going?
joe rogan
Pretty fast.
josh szeps
Like, how recently was it over the span of geological time that we were monkeys, effectively monkeys?
joe rogan
They believe 200,000 years ago human beings were in this form.
They believe, but it changes depending upon the fossil record, like when they add new evidence.
They just found, within the last couple weeks, they've recognized a new subspecies of human beings, an ancient subspecies.
They found a giant tooth.
So they're finding fossil records that pretty much...
Pretty much coincide with the established belief that people are 200,000 plus years in this form.
Like you could take a person from 200,000 years ago.
They'd probably be considerably smaller than us because they didn't get a lot of food.
And you'd put them in a movie theater and they would look just like you or I. Maybe worse teeth.
Yeah.
As long as they kept their mouths shut, we showered them, trimmed whatever fucking weird hair they had.
They're probably just very strangely hairy.
But, you know, obviously in the fossil record, we're not getting too much...
It's very rare they find skin and hair, so they're just kind of guessing what they looked like on the outside.
But they believe that about 200,000 years in this form.
Give or take 100,000 years.
josh szeps
So that's pretty recent.
joe rogan
More likely give than take.
josh szeps
Yeah.
joe rogan
It's not really give and take.
josh szeps
What's most...
What's most sort of frightening to me is how recently technology has become as powerful as it is.
Especially nukes.
And superimposing technology that was invented within the lifetime of my dad.
joe rogan
Think about what we just said.
Just that.
Let's get crazy and call it 300,000 years ago.
3,000 of your grandmas.
josh szeps
Yeah.
joe rogan
That's it.
And we're monkeys.
josh szeps
Yeah.
joe rogan
Just 3,000.
Like a good size theater show.
unidentified
Yeah.
josh szeps
Yep.
joe rogan
Like you go to the Chicago theater, that's 3,700 people.
That's a good spot to look at.
Those people in that audience, if you get a full Chicago theater of 3,700 people, if every one of them lived birth to death, just stop and think about that.
That's fucking crazy.
josh szeps
It's incredible, isn't it?
joe rogan
That's crazy.
It's fucking crazy.
That's 300,000 years.
josh szeps
And you don't even need to go that far before the kinds of lives that people were living and the kinds of concerns that they had to concern themselves with were so parochial and they knew so little.
I mean, even just back to the Middle Ages.
I mean, think about having 50 of my—no, sorry, five of my grandmothers get us back to the Middle Ages.
Five of them.
joe rogan
That's fucking crazy.
josh szeps
50 get us back to before we had, before the Parthenon.
unidentified
God.
josh szeps
I mean, we are hairless apes who just, just now, just right now, just happen to have discovered the atom.
unidentified
Amazing.
josh szeps
And technology.
joe rogan
The Chicago theater thing is really freaking me out.
josh szeps
That's a good one.
I like that.
I love that.
joe rogan
That one's freaking me out because that's monkeys.
I mean, we go back to, like, we're basically fucking, like, the scene in 2001 where they're around the monolith.
josh szeps
Yeah.
joe rogan
That's what we're talking about.
josh szeps
That's what we're talking about.
So how many people do you fit in a big stadium?
100,000, 150,000, something like that?
joe rogan
Yeah, like a giant football stadium.
The place that we did in Australia for the UFC, I believe, is 70,000 people, and that was enormous.
unidentified
Was that the MCG? That was Etihad Arena.
josh szeps
They've started sponsoring everything since I left, so I don't even know what that would be now, because Etihad...
joe rogan
I don't know.
josh szeps
It wasn't a big airline back then.
Was it in Sydney or Melbourne?
joe rogan
Melbourne.
josh szeps
Oh, right.
It'd probably be the cricket ground, right?
Formally.
joe rogan
Probably.
It's got a retractable roof.
josh szeps
Yeah, that's right.
joe rogan
It was the site of the biggest UFC ever, and it was 70,000 people.
And that's an enormous, enormous place.
But they have football places.
Like, Jamie, you're a football fan.
What's the biggest spot?
jamie vernon
I don't know if it's the exact biggest Ohio Stadium in Columbus where the Buckeyes play.
It's like 110 they can fit in there.
joe rogan
Wow.
josh szeps
It's 108,000 officially.
joe rogan
What is that like when it's filled?
That must be insane.
jamie vernon
It's crazy.
It's super loud.
I mean, the way they have the sound going too, it's a little bit...
It bounces off each other.
unidentified
Right.
But being in it so...
It's insane.
jamie vernon
That's got to be what the Colosseum was like.
joe rogan
In Rome?
I mean, half like.
jamie vernon
But there's crazy people.
unidentified
They're drunk as shit.
joe rogan
Yeah.
unidentified
They're yelling at each other.
joe rogan
Yeah.
josh szeps
And there's fights all over the place.
I've been to huge stadiums that are like 100,000, 110,000.
So let's say 100,000 stadium, right?
unidentified
Right.
josh szeps
It's a big place.
But if you use your analogy, your Chicago, my grandmother analogy...
That's 10 million years.
joe rogan
Oh my god!
josh szeps
What were we 10 million years ago?
joe rogan
We were rodents.
josh szeps
Well, when did the dinosaurs die after?
joe rogan
65 million years ago, apparently we were a type of almost like a shrew-looking rodent.
That's what we were.
That's the current theory.
josh szeps
Blowing my mind.
joe rogan
That's what really makes evolutionary deniers angry.
josh szeps
The idea that we were just shitty little rats.
unidentified
You telling me that I was a shrew?
One Ohio State football game full of people ago, I wasn't true.
josh szeps
The crazy thing is that the science deniers, the evolution deniers, are the ones who are more monkey-like than the ones who believe in science.
joe rogan
True.
That was an old Bill Hicks bit.
He used to think about people being uninvolved.
The people that don't believe in evolution are the most, they look the most uninvolved.
unidentified
Exactly.
josh szeps
Yeah, that's right.
joe rogan
Yeah.
Well, it's too hard for us to...
I mean, we're sitting here, we're not science deniers, and we're looking at the age of your grandma, 100 years, and we're just going back a few grandmas, and we're like, fuck, man.
josh szeps
Well, this is the first time I've been amazed by that, though, because I... Although, you know when else I had this feeling was Richard Dawkins has this cool analogy where he says, imagine...
He's talking about how evolution denies...
I keep wanting to say climate denies, I don't know why.
Evolution denies.
We'll talk about how there are these gaps in the fossil record, right?
And how, like, well, what happened to the species that were interim species in between the species that we find?
Richard Dawkins tries to make the point, the whole concept of a species is something that we sort of retroactively superimpose onto things because lots of animals, because the vast majority of animals die out and don't manage to...
Succeed in this world.
The vast majority of mutations fail.
But he says, imagine getting a book, imagine getting a picture book, like a high school yearbook, and it's got your photo in it on the last page, and the page before that is your mother's photo, and the page before that is her mother's photo, and the page before that is her mother's photo, right?
And you go back and back and back and back, all the way back to the first dawn of life.
hundreds of millions of years ago.
And each page is going to basically look like the page before it.
There's never going to be a point at which the shrew becomes a monkey or some amphibious creature becomes a shrew.
Every child looks like its parent.
But as you flip through the pages of this book, it's such a thick book that over time, like one of those little cartoon figures that you could draw and it looks like it's moving on the page, you just start morphing back, back, back, back, back until eventually you're a fucking fish. - Right?
Or, you know, your great-great-great-great-grandma is.
Just add in enough greats.
unidentified
Yeah.
josh szeps
And that's what people don't understand.
unidentified
It just has to be a really, really, really, really, really big book.
joe rogan
Well, our concept of time is just too hard.
Well, look at it this way.
Look at the changes that a person takes over the period of their life.
Look at a person from, you know, think about a child.
And then turn that child into your grandma before she died.
That's a very different physical looking thing as age sets in.
Yeah, sure.
There's a lot of changes that go on in nature.
Like the growth of animals, death of animals, plants and things along those lines.
There's all sorts of growth and death and all sorts of changing.
And while we're looking at it in a static form, if you go outside and look at those trees, they look exactly the same as they looked yesterday.
And it takes a long time before you recognize, like, oh, this fucking thing's growing.
josh szeps
I'm feeling that.
I'm feeling that myself, kind of, for the first time.
Like, my birthday yesterday.
And I've gotten to that age where, you know, I don't really care about, I don't really know.
Like, when I booked this trip, I didn't even know that it was my birthday yesterday.
joe rogan
How old are you?
38. That's when you start denying it.
I'm 48, so you really start denying it.
josh szeps
Denying what?
Getting older.
joe rogan
I'm not even paying attention to that.
That's not even important to me.
unidentified
Why?
joe rogan
I'm concentrating on the present.
I live in the moment, Joshua.
josh szeps
It's a comforting bullshit, isn't it?
joe rogan
When you get to be like 78, you're just like, what do you do?
What are you going to not do?
Parasail, because you're 78, you know?
josh szeps
No, that's right.
But I think that the most...
It is true, though, that, like, you know, age is on the inside, because I can feel that now, at this age, I just have to do a shit more work not to feel crappy.
joe rogan
Yes.
josh szeps
When you're 22, it's just...
Everything's great.
unidentified
Yeah.
josh szeps
Your body is just automatically functioning exactly as it should.
Now, like, my ankle will just occasionally hurt.
You know?
That didn't happen when I was 22. I actually remember the first time in my life when I was getting out of a car, and as I got out of the car seat, I went...
unidentified
I was like, what the fuck was that?
josh szeps
Did I just grunt as I was getting up?
I never grunted.
You know, just a very small, like...
joe rogan
Just to get out of a car seat?
josh szeps
Wow.
Yeah, but you know, just like you might.
It's not a big deal.
It's just like a teenager just leaps out of the car seat.
joe rogan
Right.
josh szeps
When an old person gets out of the car seat going...
joe rogan
That's a good point.
josh szeps
I noticed when I for the first time just did a little...
joe rogan
Yeah.
josh szeps
It's like, I'm getting all...
joe rogan
Gotta exercise.
josh szeps
Welcome to my 30s.
joe rogan
That's the other thing, is nature is trying to kill you.
And nature would like you to give in to the same decay that you see in animals and the forest and what have you.
It would like you to just accept the natural process.
But us and our clever little minds have figured out how to mitigate that process, at least slightly, with exercise and nutrition, proper rest and supplementation.
Hormone supplementation and going to the doctors and new inventions and cryotherapy and all this crazy shit that people figured out how to just...
Just put the brakes on this fucking inevitable demise.
josh szeps
I know.
We're living way too long for nature.
Nature loves us up until we're in our late teens, early 20s.
joe rogan
Yeah.
josh szeps
But by now, I've been like, I've been cum and sperm for decades.
Nature's like, you must have had kids by now, right?
joe rogan
TMI. You must have.
Too much information.
josh szeps
I think everyone can figure out that I've probably been able to cum since I was a Teenager.
joe rogan
Well, you may be gone tantric.
You might be one of those dudes.
josh szeps
Possible.
joe rogan
Trying to keep the cum inside them and revigorate their body.
josh szeps
Do they do that?
Is that a real thing?
unidentified
Yeah.
josh szeps
Can you actually consistently orgasm over a long period of time without cumming?
joe rogan
The problem with all that, and I'm sure I'm going to get tweets about this, is everyone who practices it is a fucking lunatic.
josh szeps
So you don't know, because you haven't actually tested it out.
joe rogan
Yeah, so if you talk to them, they'll tell you, yes, I completely come inside.
unidentified
I come internally.
I absorb, I reabsorb, and the energy that I get from that is so much more amazing than the energy that you would get from an external orgasm.
joe rogan
And then they just get really into talking to you about tantric, and they get annoying.
josh szeps
Do they do it by contracting the muscle that starts with a P, whose name I'm forgetting, between your balls and your ass?
No, there's a particular muscle there, which apparently, if you learn to build it up, like we're doing exercises throughout the day, then it will compress and it will push against the...
Whatever that tube is called.
I'm really medically astute today.
The dick hole tube.
joe rogan
So it's like a male Kegel, right?
josh szeps
Yeah, exactly.
joe rogan
That women do.
Have you ever seen that Russian lady that can pick up, I think she can carry like 32 kilograms for their pussy.
It might be more than that.
It's like more than 70 pounds, I believe.
josh szeps
No, I haven't, Joe.
joe rogan
Yeah, she has this ability to like, I guess they put like a ball and then attach a string to a ball.
At the end of the string is a weight.
And she puts that ball inside of her pussy and just locks down on that motherfucker and then can literally lift up like 70 pounds of weight.
josh szeps
It's impressive.
I've stood at one end of a strip club in Bangkok, had a Thai stripper fire darts from the other side of the room out of her pussy and pop a balloon that I was holding over my head.
Wow.
And she could fire those things with such aim.
I don't know why I was so stupid, because I could have taken an eye out.
joe rogan
What kind of speed are we looking at?
josh szeps
Speed.
I mean, enough speed.
Yeah, speed.
Like, what?
She must have been a good 10 meters, so maybe 30 feet away from me.
joe rogan
Oh, my God.
josh szeps
And she's firing them across the room fast enough to be able to pop a balloon.
joe rogan
With accuracy.
josh szeps
With accuracy.
joe rogan
That's insane.
Now, how is she doing this?
Does she have her elbows to the back of her knees, and she's got her pussy up in the air?
josh szeps
No, she was standing up.
I'm trying to picture exactly what position she was in.
Yeah, she was sort of kneeling and, like, standing.
joe rogan
Kneeling away from you.
josh szeps
No, sorry, not kneeling.
Bent knees, but standing upright, and with a thrust of the hips.
joe rogan
Boy.
josh szeps
Shooting it out.
joe rogan
What?
Bent knees, standing upright, facing you?
josh szeps
Facing me.
unidentified
Wow.
joe rogan
That's crazy.
That's like shooting a gun in the air when you're pointing it at the ground.
That doesn't even make any sense.
How does she do that?
josh szeps
She might have had her hands on the ground.
To be honest, Joe, I wasn't focused on her fucking position.
I was focused on whether or not she was going to take my eye out.
I had my eyes closed most of the time.
joe rogan
Well, if she had her hands on the ground, now it makes perfect sense.
So she's like a table.
josh szeps
Yeah, a table sitting upright.
joe rogan
How's she getting the air to launch that thing?
unidentified
I don't know.
joe rogan
That's what's confusing about that.
josh szeps
There was so many things that she was doing.
Like, they have all kinds of tricks.
They have all kinds of tricks.
It started out with ping pong balls, you know, all the classic things.
Also razor blades.
joe rogan
Oh.
josh szeps
It's not pleasant.
joe rogan
Isn't it amazing what people will do if you're confronted with a town filled with drunk tourists who have already seen everything.
They've seen Muay Thai kickboxing fights where 16-year-old kids have fucking shinned each other in the head until they go unconscious.
They've seen...
Legalized prostitution everywhere.
Ladyboys everywhere.
Everything is chaos.
Just fucking scooters with 37 people piled on them.
And what do they got to do?
They have to adapt.
unidentified
What's left?
joe rogan
It's evolution.
It's adapt or die.
You know, you have to adapt.
You have to figure out how to stand out.
Well, you got to shoot a dart out of your pussy, honey.
josh szeps
That Josh Zipps' head.
joe rogan
Yeah, there's...
I mean, you want to make the argument that people are malleable.
That's like one of the best arguments.
Like, look at that.
That's...
josh szeps
Not to mention, like, I mean, I've been to shows there where there are just, I remember the finale to one show where it was like, there were about 15 to 25. How many fucking shows did you go there?
I go there a lot!
joe rogan
Do you go to Thailand a lot?
josh szeps
Yeah, Thailand is, I like to say that Thailand is sort of our Mexico, if you're Australian.
It's nearby, it's cheap, it's beautiful, there are great beaches.
joe rogan
How far is the flight?
josh szeps
I mean, everything's sort of far for most Australians because Sydney and Melbourne are located on the southeast coast of Australia, so there's a lot of Australia to fly over.
Australia's the same size as the contiguous United States, so you basically have to do the entire flight from the equivalent of Miami to Seattle before you start entering Asian airspace.
So from Australia, the country itself, it'd probably only be two or three hours to Bangkok.
It's only like...
An hour or two to Indonesia and Singapore.
But from Sydney, then you've got to add on an extra six hours just to get out of Australian airspace.
joe rogan
That's amazing that you guys are the same size, that Australia is the same size as America as far as the continental or close to it.
But there's only 20 million people, so you have less people than California.
josh szeps
We have half, yeah, I mean two-thirds of the population of California in an area the size of the United States if you get rid of Alaska.
joe rogan
It's a badass country.
I fucking love it there.
I was just there.
josh szeps
I know you were, yeah, that whole upset, right?
joe rogan
I had a great fucking time.
I did stand-up there, too, the Pillay Theater.
It's fucking incredible.
I love it up there.
Down there, wherever the fuck it is.
It's down.
Depends on which way you go.
josh szeps
Exactly.
joe rogan
If you go north, you can get there.
josh szeps
You'll get there eventually.
The globe's round, Joe.
joe rogan
Yes.
And it's spinning.
The fucker doesn't stand still.
But I love Australia.
It's an awesome country.
It really is.
The people there are cool as fuck.
josh szeps
Yeah.
Yeah.
Aussies are nice.
joe rogan
It's great.
That's my number one go-to spot if the apocalypse happens.
josh szeps
Yep.
joe rogan
If North America falls apart, Australia is pretty much self-supporting.
It's democratic, really cool, nice people.
josh szeps
Yep.
Lots of space.
joe rogan
Plenty of animals to eat.
josh szeps
Yep.
Plenty of land to...
joe rogan
Plenty of fish.
Jesus Christ.
josh szeps
I mean, you've got the whole South Pacific right there.
joe rogan
Yeah, you just can't...
You've got to watch out for your fucking killer jellyfish.
Everywhere you turn, you have something that can kill you.
unidentified
That's true.
joe rogan
They have...
If people don't know, you've got to look up this thing called box jellyfish.
Because they have...
They get a bay filled with box jellyfish.
And they'll say, don't go in the water, mate.
The box jellyfish are there.
unidentified
They'll kill you instantly.
joe rogan
How do you say straight off?
They'll kill you straight off.
josh szeps
Kill you straight off.
joe rogan
Yeah.
They will kill you instantly.
josh szeps
They paralyze you when you go into anaphylactic shock.
joe rogan
You're just dead.
You're dead.
I mean, some people survive if you get hit with one or two tentacles, but you're fucked, man, for like years.
josh szeps
Yeah, well, don't go in the water.
joe rogan
What the fuck does that mean?
It's the goddamn water!
josh szeps
But in all of the areas of Australia, for a start, they're only there during certain times of the year.
So you were there in summer.
And they're not in Sydney or Melbourne, so you don't have to worry about them there.
You must have gone up to the Great Barrier Reef or something?
joe rogan
No, no, no.
I was just talking to people.
I didn't go in the fucking water.
I'm not retarded.
josh szeps
You can go in the water in Melbourne, it's fine.
joe rogan
No, no, no, you can't.
They move around.
The water, I don't know if you know, it's all connected.
They could just travel to you.
josh szeps
No, that's like saying that you're going to get eaten by a great white shark in Alaska.
The great white sharks don't go to Alaska.
joe rogan
Don't go in the water in Alaska if it's connected to where the great white sharks live.
josh szeps
So just never go in the water anyway.
joe rogan
It's the same fucking water.
It's the same water.
josh szeps
Yeah, but we're talking about gigantic distances.
joe rogan
As far as we know.
As far as we know, they don't go there, but they could.
josh szeps
No, they couldn't.
They died.
It'd be too cold for them.
joe rogan
If you knew that the woods were filled with werewolves, but only at a certain time of the year, would you go during a full moon?
No!
You wouldn't.
I'll answer for you.
josh szeps
Depends on whether or not I trust it.
What you're saying is basically like, you shouldn't go hiking in Panama because there are bears in Canada.
joe rogan
That's exactly what I'm saying.
josh szeps
Yeah, there you go.
So we've got a, Jamie's just brought up an image.
joe rogan
Marine stingers are dangerous.
josh szeps
Marine stingers are dangerous.
Don't swim in these waters between October and May.
joe rogan
Severe box jelly sting.
So what are they?
Emergency treatment.
Oh, that's one of those, they have a bucket of like vinegar.
Yeah, that's right.
So even then, you're still fucked.
josh szeps
There's a species called the Irukandji, which I can't remember whether it's the same as a box jellyfish or not, but someone's going to tweet me now that I've said that.
And there was a case where these scientists on the Great Barrier Reef, they were studying the Irukandji, and they're almost invisible.
They're very tiny, small little jellyfish with extremely long tentacles.
And they do the same thing as the box jellyfish, if they're not the same thing as the box jellyfish.
And they had like a carton, a bottle of Irukandji in water, and they put it in their research fridge.
And a dude came in and drank the water, thinking it was drinking water, and died instantly.
joe rogan
Oh, my God.
josh szeps
Yeah.
joe rogan
Jesus Christ.
josh szeps
Put a label on it, you idiots!
joe rogan
Put a fucking skull and crossbones on that shit.
josh szeps
Yeah, there you go.
There's an Eurekanji.
joe rogan
That is that little tiny thing will kill you.
josh szeps
Yeah.
joe rogan
What the fuck, man?
josh szeps
We're badass.
joe rogan
No, you need to clean your water out.
Your water's filled with the enemy.
Those are murderers.
josh szeps
She'd get some governors saying that we're not going to let any urokanji into the country anymore.
joe rogan
Yeah.
That is insane.
It's insane that that little tiny thing can kill you.
josh szeps
Yeah.
joe rogan
That is unbelievable.
josh szeps
But I mean, only Americans make a big deal out of how dangerous things in Australia are.
joe rogan
Well, that's because you fuckers are used to it.
It's like the Thai lady with the ping pong balls coming out of her pussy.
That's normal in Thailand.
josh szeps
I mean...
The reality about Australia is we've managed to export this Steve Irwin crocodile hunter vision of Australia as if we're all rugged outdoorsmen who live in the bush in the outback.
The reality is almost half the country lives in two big cities and we're all sitting around swilling Chardonnay and drinking lattes complaining about property prices and sitting on yachts and going to the beach.
Very few Australians live in the outback.
We're a very urbanised country.
America is much more It has much more regional variants.
There's no equivalent of the South in Australia.
joe rogan
Right.
josh szeps
Or the Midwest, even.
joe rogan
Melbourne was incredible as far as the food.
The food was amazing.
josh szeps
It's great, isn't it?
joe rogan
The coffee and the food.
And the wine.
Oh, my God.
They know how to live.
josh szeps
Yeah, we do.
joe rogan
They're doing it right.
josh szeps
Yep.
joe rogan
But you get killed everywhere.
josh szeps
But that's my point.
joe rogan
Box jellyfish and fucking brown snakes.
josh szeps
The sharks aren't coming into the harbor.
unidentified
How about those brown snakes?
josh szeps
Not in large numbers.
Well, they're not coming into downtown.
joe rogan
They're everywhere.
unidentified
Yeah.
josh szeps
You saw him?
joe rogan
You can find him.
My friend Adam, my friend Adam Greentree, he lives out there.
And he works, he has a business and something involves mines.
And they'll be working, like digging holes.
And, you know, doing stuff out in the bush, I guess you guys call it, the bush, and they'll just find these brown snakes, which will just fucking kill you.
unidentified
Yeah.
joe rogan
Like, they bite you and you're dead.
josh szeps
Yeah.
joe rogan
Yeah.
josh szeps
Well, actually, people haven't died from a snake bite or a spider bite, I don't think, since all of the anti-venoms were discovered in the early 80s.
joe rogan
Really?
josh szeps
Because every local medical center has all the anti-venoms.
joe rogan
How long does it take for a brown snake to kill you?
josh szeps
Hours.
joe rogan
Oh, okay.
josh szeps
Yeah, you've got hours.
joe rogan
So you've got a little bit of time.
josh szeps
Yep, and most Australians are trained in knowing how to basically, you know, obviously put a tourniquet on so that you can, you know, maybe suck out the venom and spit it out and identify what the snake was.
joe rogan
Well, I find rattlesnakes on my property out here.
josh szeps
Right.
joe rogan
All the time.
josh szeps
How long do they take to kill you?
joe rogan
It'll take a few hours, but it'll fuck you up.
I've had my dogs bitten three times.
I've had to have them go and get antivenom.
And for people, if you're broke, it's fucked.
Because you don't have any money.
It costs thousands of dollars for this antivenom stuff.
Otherwise, you're going to watch your dog die.
Because they swell up.
The only way I found out they got bit was I knew that they were barking and barking and barking.
So I went outside and said, ah, fuck, there's a rattlesnake.
And so I killed the rattlesnake.
And then they seem okay.
But then all of a sudden I see some swelling on their face.
I'm like, God damn it.
And so then I have to take them down.
Because the rattlesnake will bite them and then pull away and still be alive and then bite them again.
And so their face just swole up like cartoonish, like a water balloon.
Yeah, but they're fine in a day or so.
josh szeps
Yeah, good.
It's just expensive.
I mean, if a person gets bitten in Australia, obviously they don't have to pay because we have communism.
joe rogan
That's a good communism.
You know, I really get really pissed off when people talk about healthcare and healthcare in America and this idea that somehow or another it's better to not have people covered with medical insurance.
And there's always been Medicaid and there's always been, for extreme example, people have had medical issues that have put them in severe debt.
I don't think that we shouldn't have private care in terms of the best doctors and the best surgeons should be allowed to be compensated for their excellence.
I mean, I don't think there's anything wrong with that, but the idea that we don't have some sort...
I mean, we have roads that are taken care of by our taxes.
Why the fuck do we not have medical insurance or medical care that's just standard?
josh szeps
And this is exactly what we're going to talk about on my podcast, hashtag WeThePeopleLive, which we're going to do immediately after this, because I want to talk to you about Bernie Sanders.
joe rogan
We can talk about it right now, too.
josh szeps
We can do it both.
joe rogan
We can do it later, now, whatever.
You're freaking people out.
They're like, what the fuck?
I've got to download something else?
I just think that a country that cares about its people, one of the most important things is the safety and the health of the people.
You shouldn't have to pay for the police.
You shouldn't have to pay for the army.
It shouldn't be something that comes out of your check.
Like, you know, oh, you want to call the police?
Well, we're going to require a credit card.
No, no, no, the guy's breaking into my house.
Well, do you have a current credit card?
Like, no, no, no, no, no, I need the cops.
josh szeps
I mean, I hear people like Rush Limbaugh saying...
joe rogan
Should we buy everyone a car?
Do you want to get a car?
He's a fat fuck.
I don't listen to him.
josh szeps
Do you remember?
joe rogan
Fucking pill-popping asshole.
josh szeps
Al Franken was on Letterman promoting his book called Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot.
Do you remember Al's book?
joe rogan
He wouldn't be able to write that book today because he'd be fat shaming.
josh szeps
That's probably true, actually.
And Letterman's first question is, that's an interesting title.
How'd you come up with that title?
And Al goes, well, for a start, he's very, very fat.
LAUGHTER I love Al.
joe rogan
Didn't he lose a lot of weight, though, when he got on OxyContin?
Yeah, probably.
He was taking 99 pills a day.
That fills up a lot of holes.
Like, you know, you think about how many 99 OxyContin's.
It's a good handful of mass.
josh szeps
Was he?
Is that what he was doing?
99?
joe rogan
Yeah.
It's fairly standard for severe junkies.
They just start building up.
They start to take two and three at a time.
josh szeps
This is why you then graduate to SMAC and why we've got the heroin epidemic that we do in places like New England.
joe rogan
Yeah, but that's too hard.
You've got to shoot it.
It's really easy to swallow those pills.
josh szeps
You can snort it.
joe rogan
Yeah, but also you're getting this inexact amount.
Like when you just take a pill.
You have one pill.
You throw it down your fat, stupid face.
josh szeps
Yeah, 99 though.
joe rogan
He was taking a lot.
Pull that up, Jamie.
Find out exactly how many he was taking.
He was taking so much that...
Granted...
This was told to me by Alex Jones, so I don't know exactly if I can authenticate the veracity of this particular statement.
josh szeps
I'll take that qualification.
joe rogan
But he said that that was why he went deaf.
Because, do you remember, Rush Limbaugh was going deaf.
But he had a real medical explanation for when you overdose on opiates, when you take massive amounts of opiates.
It affects your central nervous system in such a profound way, and it affects your entire physical body in such a profound way that it's possible you can induce hearing loss.
josh szeps
I mean, I have sympathy for the guy just because he's caught up in what is a problem beyond any individual's sort of control.
Like, the problem of over-prescription of opiates in America and, like, drug addiction.
Did you see that study, by the way?
joe rogan
Yeah, but he wasn't over-prescribed.
He was actively seeking out these prescriptions.
He lives in Florida.
josh szeps
But it's an addiction.
joe rogan
It is an addiction.
But he was also a massive hypocrite that was talking bad about people.
josh szeps
And I completely disagree with almost everything he says.
I have a grudging admiration for him as an entertainer and a broadcaster because I think he's so great.
joe rogan
Well, he speaks very confidently.
josh szeps
Well, he's so good at getting you into a position in which his bullshit sounds reasonable.
joe rogan
Yes.
unidentified
Right?
josh szeps
And like drawing a kind of a line of logical fallacies in such a way that you end up thinking, yeah, this guy's making a lot of sense.
joe rogan
What's interesting is that he was really hamstrung and broken down when he called that woman a slut who was trying to get birth control.
Like she was trying to get...
josh szeps
She wanted birth control to be covered, right?
joe rogan
Yeah.
josh szeps
By her university or insurance or something?
joe rogan
Yeah, some sort of insurance.
And, you know, he started calling her a slut and saying all these terrible things about her.
But I believe she needed birth control because of another medical ailment.
It wasn't just...
I might be wrong about that.
But it might...
josh szeps
Well, either way, his argument was, and it's a perfect example of what I'm talking about, where he starts with something simple.
unidentified
He's like, what do you call a woman who wants to be paid...
josh szeps
For sex!
joe rogan
That's a pretty good...
You've got to get rid of the Australian accent, though.
josh szeps
I can't, Jack.
I'm not saying I do rush.
I wouldn't claim to be a rush impersonator.
joe rogan
She's a slut, ladies and gentlemen.
unidentified
She's a slut!
She's a slut!
josh szeps
But he ended up getting to slut because his logical argument was she wants to be paid for something that is only needed if she wants to have recreational sex.
Well, what do you call someone who we pay to have recreational sex?
A prostitute.
joe rogan
A slut.
Jamie, find that out if you get a chance, but I do believe that she needed it for another reason.
There's other reasons why women take birth control.
josh szeps
Yeah, that's true.
Absolutely.
joe rogan
Like, women with severe acne take birth control.
josh szeps
Yeah.
joe rogan
There's a lot of other things that birth control can help.
But either way, he's a fat fuck and a dummy.
josh szeps
He is.
joe rogan
Not that there's anything wrong with being a fat fuck.
Some of my best friends are fat fucks.
There's nothing wrong with being overweight, ladies and gentlemen.
Well, there's something wrong for you.
It's not healthy.
But, you know, you could fix that.
It's hard, but you could fix that.
Just as easy as it is to get off of heroin.
As easy as it is for Rush Limbaugh to get off heroin, he could get off sugar and simple fucking carbs and all that stupid shit that makes you balloon up like that.
josh szeps
Maybe just walk on a treadmill for 30 minutes...
joe rogan
It's hard.
josh szeps
In the morning?
joe rogan
It's hard for people to change their patterns.
It's hard for people to get excited about doing something that's difficult to do that's going to be ultimately beneficial for them because it drains your energy in the short term.
You work out if you're out of shape.
You ever seen an out of shape person work out?
josh szeps
Yeah.
joe rogan
Fuck, man.
josh szeps
Horrible.
joe rogan
I've taken people to the gym that don't work out.
Like, come on.
Come to the gym with me.
We'll just do a little bit of a workout.
And you get them on an elliptical machine.
And you just go, we're going to do 20 minutes on an elliptical machine.
And you look over five minutes in.
They're ready to fucking die.
I mean, they turn white.
Like, their face turns flush.
It's crazy.
It's weird to watch.
You watch them struggle.
And then you get them to the weights.
And they just can't do anything.
They're so tired.
josh szeps
Did you see the study that came out recently about the huge increase in the death rate, the fatality rate of white people between the age of 35 and 50, I think it was?
joe rogan
No.
josh szeps
So there's a spike which epidemiologists are saying is as noticeable in the data as the AIDS epidemic was in the 1980s.
unidentified
Whoa!
josh szeps
And there are three causes.
joe rogan
Lattes.
josh szeps
No, I thought it was going to be diet, right?
When we're talking about this, I thought it was going to be heart disease or something that's related to diet and exercise.
It's suicide, it's booze, and it's drug overdoses.
joe rogan
Wow.
josh szeps
And this is the only demographic group in America where the numbers are going up.
joe rogan
Well, I think there's a lot of people that live a very unsatisfying life, and they got roped into living this unsatisfying life because someone told them they have to make a living, that they have to make tough choices, and they have to go do things that they don't want to do, and then find a good job with a fucking plumbing supply company or some stupid shit they don't really want to do when they really want to be a musician or whatever, and then they just live depressed.
I think that's a giant percentage of people.
josh szeps
And it's getting worse.
I was talking yesterday on Facebook to a buddy of mine in Australia, Jacob Stone.
Hey, Jacob.
I'm sure he'll be listening to this.
He's a big fan of yours.
joe rogan
You fucker.
josh szeps
About how...
But now we just start ripping on him.
joe rogan
Fucker's a good thing in America.
We call each other fuckers all the time.
josh szeps
Yeah, if we were in Scotland, we'd be like, he's a good cunt.
joe rogan
He's a good cunt.
josh szeps
But we were talking about how you're not allowed anymore to have any feelings as a white man that are anything other than guilt about being a white man.
joe rogan
Well, first acknowledge your privilege before you even say that.
You right now should acknowledge your white privilege before you even talk about what white people are and aren't around.
What about non-cisgendered people of colour?
josh szeps
I was just listening to...
You know Sam Harris, right?
Yeah.
So I was just listening to the latest episode of his podcast where he's talking to this guy, Douglas Murray, who's this English conservative, and Douglas is saying that when the jihadi nuke finally goes off, what we're all going to be talking about is transgender pronouns.
unidentified
Right?
josh szeps
It's like...
That'll be the discussion about whether to call them he, she, they, or zay at the point when real shit's going down.
We're so distracted by so many little cultural pieces of bullshit at the moment that we're losing sight of the big picture.
joe rogan
I think it's because it's too easy to get by.
I think, again, it's very easy to live today.
Much easier than it has been at any point in time.
And I think, also, it's very easy to communicate today.
Much more easy than it has been at any other point in time.
And before this era, the era of instant communication, if you had an idea, it had to be really good to get it out there to the masses.
It had to be really good.
It had to go through editors and publicists.
It had to go to publishers.
They had to print it.
People had to read it and recommend it.
It had to be verified.
It had to be excellent.
If you were Hunter S. Thompson, there was a lot of jumps you had to go through, a lot of hoops, a lot of ladders you had to climb before you could publish Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
Today, any fucking dipshit can start a hashtag activist, some sort of a...
You could start a Tumblr blog or anything, and then it can immediately be picked up by people that also want to be outraged, and they'll go on this goddamn rampage, and it's confusing as fuck.
It's because...
It's so easy to get by.
We were like spoiled rich kids, in a way.
Spoiled rich kids with our ability to communicate ideas.
josh szeps
I mean, I think the lowering of the barriers is a good thing and a bad thing, right?
I mean, the flattening and the fact that I don't have to go and talk to a network executive or a radio station owner about doing my podcast.
I can just do the show that I want to do and put it out there is great.
But you're right that we've become...
Douglas Murray, this British conservative columnist, was saying...
He thinks that the problem is that there's a supply and demand problem between social justice warriors and racists.
Because there aren't enough racists anymore, right?
So the left used to be agitated by fighting all of these big, good, noble fights.
But the fascists and the racists and all the people who they wanted to bring down have basically been vanquished.
Not totally, but now they have to accuse people like me of being racist.
I was accused of being racist the other day because I used the phrase to call a spade a spade.
joe rogan
Whoa.
josh szeps
And in the 1920s...
joe rogan
You got called a racist for that?
josh szeps
Yeah, in Harlem in the 1920s, a spade was a bad word for black people.
joe rogan
Not just the 1920s, that's like pretty recently.
josh szeps
Was it?
Yeah.
Not in Australian language, so I wasn't even aware.
joe rogan
American language, even in like the 70s and the 80s, people would use it in disparaging ways, like the spades.
unidentified
Right.
josh szeps
Okay, so I'd never heard it, but apparently I'm racist now.
Because there aren't enough actual racists to keep shouting at, so they have to start shouting at people.
joe rogan
But a spade a spade is a card term.
josh szeps
Yeah, that's right.
joe rogan
It's a term about playing cards.
To call a spade a spade is like a club or a spade or a heart.
Like, that is so fucking stupid.
josh szeps
Did you see...
And also, I posted something on Facebook about...
Did you see the brouhaha about Meryl Streep's t-shirt?
joe rogan
No.
josh szeps
So she's just finished shooting a movie in London called Suffragette, in which she plays Emmeline Pankhurst, who was one of the great women's rights campaigners back in the late 1800s, early 1900s.
It's about the birth of the feminism movement.
And in 1913, Pankhurst gave this speech, this famous speech for women's rights, in which she said that the women's rights movement will survive, quote, So long as there is a woman alive to hold up the flag of rebellion, I would rather be a rebel than a slave.
So they do this promotional thing, in which, here's Meryl Streep wearing a t-shirt, I'd rather be a rebel than a slave.
Meaning, I'd rather fight for my rights than be downtrodden as a woman in the early part of the 20th century.
Well, the internet blew up with how racist Meryl is, because she's not understanding the context of that.
I mean, there are...
Hashtag.
So I put a...
Like, here are some of the tweets.
I can't believe this is real, someone said with a link to it, that the word rebel is juxtaposed with slave in that quote.
Just, I can't fathom this.
Someone else says...
Someone else tries to school him, says, the quote is from Emmeline Pankhurst, who said it in a 1913 rally for women's rights, to which the social justice warriors respond...
And I'm letting you know that it doesn't matter who said it.
The quote is trash.
And another person, white women have said a lot of terrible things over the course of history.
Doesn't mean you wear it on a shirt.
And this just goes on and on.
And I put it on Facebook and just said, I'm glad that we're focusing on what's really important.
And, like, a black friend of mine said, you know, just started attacking me for being an apologist for racism.
joe rogan
A black friend of yours?
josh szeps
Yeah.
joe rogan
What black friend is this?
josh szeps
What?
I'm not going to name him.
joe rogan
You don't have to name him, but fuck him.
LAUGHTER He knows you're not racist.
That's stupid.
God damn it.
The problem is, there's not enough problems.
josh szeps
Well, that's kind of what I mean about the supply and demand thing, right?
There's not enough actual problems for them to focus on.
So, no, I think what I said, what I wrote on Facebook was, political correctness is exhausting.
And he wrote, being black is exhausting.
joe rogan
Okay.
josh szeps
I bet it is.
Yeah.
And I wrote, right, fortunately, that t-shirt has nothing to do with being black.
And then he went off onto this thing about how you have to understand how other people are going to perceive things, and we have to be cognizant of always using the right words.
And it just ends up spiralling down into this situation where all of a sudden I have to be censoring every single word that I say in case some idiot misinterprets it and doesn't understand the historical context that we're talking about the women's movement in...
Like, early 20th century Britain and not the fight against slavery in America?
joe rogan
I don't buy it.
I don't buy it.
I don't think people are really offended by it.
I think it's a green light issue.
I think it's a green...
They look at Meryl Streep in that t-shirt, and if they understand the context of what she's trying to say...
Like, if you quote the original piece that it was taken from...
If they still have a problem with that, then what they're doing is just finding a green light.
It's a cunt green light.
I can go.
I can go.
I can hit the gas.
That's what it is.
It's all it is.
It doesn't make any sense.
She's posting something, or she has a t-shirt on, rather, that's taken from a historical quote.
It's really simple.
If you have an issue with those words, because those words can be used in other forms, well, that's your issue.
But to make a big deal of it, and that you have to be more aware, and you have to be, you know, because being black is exhausting, or being Chinese, we built the railroads, for you to ride that railroad and not acknowledge the fact that Chinese people died during the making of that railroad, fucking Christ!
Enough!
What we need is wolves.
We need wolves at the gates.
What we need is a fucking winter.
We need winters coming.
We need a fucking day.
josh szeps
This is my thing, but we've just had Paris.
joe rogan
Yes.
josh szeps
The Paris attacks.
unidentified
That's in Paris.
joe rogan
If you're in Paris, I bet it's like that.
You know, 9-11, after September 11th in New York, New York was fucking amazing.
And I hate to say this in terms like, this is not minimizing the victims or the families of the victims and horrible tragedy, without a doubt.
No one's denying that.
But what I'm saying is...
We were in New York City, me and some friends, when we were filming Fear Factor.
And it was about 10 months or 11 months after 9-11.
My memory might be bad.
But the point being, people were noticeably more friendly.
Noticeably more like they were engaging.
They would say hi to each other.
The fireman came.
I had a friend who blacked out because I gave her some California weed.
We were hanging out in front of this bar.
It was all these people that work for Fear Factor.
And I busted out a joint.
I go, you guys want to get down or what?
What do you want to do?
Come on, pussies.
And there's all these producers.
They're like, okay, okay, we'll try some.
We'll try some.
This is fucking space weed.
Just the deepest, blackest hole space weed, right?
She takes a deep hit, and you see her eyes start to flutter and roll behind her head.
And luckily, I was in a position to catch her.
And I moved in and we grabbed her as she was, like, she was literally just blacking out on the concrete.
josh szeps
That's some serious shit, dude.
joe rogan
It was some serious weed.
But it's apparently, it can happen to certain people if you don't smoke a lot of weed.
And she just decided, fuck it, let's give it a shot.
She took a big hit.
And you see her eyes fluttering and she just gave up.
So we called the fireman.
The fireman came and it was like...
Like a nobleman on a knight on a horse had arrived.
Everybody was so happy to see the firemen, like first responders, got so much love.
It was amazing.
unidentified
It was cool.
josh szeps
Hundreds of their colleagues had just died.
joe rogan
It was also the fact that people recognized the importance of having first responders, having firemen, having policemen, and that they really felt it like in a deep, real way, like, thank you.
Thank you for what you do.
If it wasn't for what you do, we would be in so much more danger.
It's having a very real memory of them stepping in and risking their lives and helping people and seeing them covered with dust as they carried people out of the buildings.
It was solidified in people's memories.
Over the past, you know, decade or so, you go back and it's back to being New York again.
People don't look at each other, fuck you.
Like, there was a feeling of vulnerability that existed because we had recognized a real problem.
And we had gone through a real, they had gone through, a real moment of intense adversity.
josh szeps
Did you see in the wake of Paris, one of the things that I found interesting was...
This conversation around tragedy hipsters, did you hear about that?
unidentified
Tragedy hipster.
josh szeps
Tragedy hipster is someone who, the moment something like the Paris attacks happens, starts shitting on people who are pouring out sympathy online or changing their Facebook profile pictures to the French flag or something by saying, "Well, where were you?
Why weren't you outraged when there was Beirut?" Like, I've got an article here in The Stranger, which is the Seattle blog entitled, "Why putting the French flag on the Space Needle is racist." What?
joe rogan
By Charles Medidi, November 16. Why didn't anybody acknowledge the attacks in Lebanon?
Why didn't anybody acknowledge the attacks in Nigeria?
josh szeps
That's the point.
joe rogan
Well, there's a real racist aspect to that, and I think there's a real argument for that.
josh szeps
It's weird.
I think we have to be allowed to allow people to express...
Like, sympathy...
joe rogan
Yes.
josh szeps
I also find it a bit fatuous when everyone starts pouring out, you know, all of it.
There are certain fashionable things to care about.
You know, it's a bit like the Coney 2012 phenomenon or something, right?
Yes.
Where all of a sudden everyone jumps on some social media, social justice bandwagon.
But I feel like Paris is a bit...
Yes, people should pay attention to Beirut.
Yes, people should pay attention to Nigeria and Boko Haram.
Yes, people should be more aware of what's going on.
But as Obama said in the wake of the Paris attacks, it is understandable for people to have a more instinctive, sympathetic reaction to a city that they know, a city that they've been to, a city populated by people like them who are doing things just like them, going to see a soccer game, sitting in a restaurant.
Than they are for parts of the world where they think that violence is more commonplace, like Nigeria.
I don't think you can be belittling people for genuine expressions of sympathy.
I certainly don't think that you should be accusing them of being racist.
joe rogan
I agree with you wholeheartedly.
I don't think you should accuse people of anything negative for expressing sympathy.
But I think that culturally, when you look at the news, and when you look at CNN, and the people that are supposed to be responsible for...
Letting us know what's happening in the world.
That's where the issue lies.
Like, why are they concentrating solely on Paris?
Why doesn't CNN have all this coverage of Lebanon and Nigeria that mirrors it?
So you get this broad perspective of the actual world itself and say, look, this ISIS issue is not just an issue that happened to Europeans.
This is an issue that's been happening all over the world for a while now.
josh szeps
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
And CNN is fucking awful, and I'm definitely not going to defend CNN. I mean, CNN is the worst example, I think, of just following the most predictable line on everything.
They try not to alienate anyone by being too left or too right, and as a consequence, they're just a mush of ignorance and parochialism.
joe rogan
But what do you do?
If you're Jeff Zucker, if you're the guy who runs CNN, what the fuck do you do?
But you put Anthony Bourdain's show on, that's a good move.
But what else do you do?
How the fuck do you cover the news in a broad way and also make it a profitable entertainment enterprise?
josh szeps
Well, I would like to think that there's a market for smart conversations about things, which is what I try to do at Half Post Live, and we don't get small numbers.
I mean, oftentimes I'm surprised when I have a smart conversation about the relationship between Islamism to Islam and the plight of poor Muslims in the suburbs of European capitals where unemployment is 35%, and the demographics of the types of people in Iraq who are joining ISIS who were 14 years old during the U.S. invasion and who've just endured...
all of their the rest of their lives basically being full of civil war and people being beheaded and strung up in the streets and who hated saddam but hate america and hate the west now for everything they've been through like when we talk about all that sort of stuff some people are actually you know significant numbers of people are actually interested in hearing about it in Instead of, meanwhile on CNN, should the mayor of this city in the Midwest that has a majority Muslim population be afraid?
joe rogan
How come you can do that so good, but you can't do Rush?
That was a total American accent.
No, you're right.
josh szeps
Do what I can.
joe rogan
It's...
People are problematic.
It's very difficult for people to separate their motives from the reality of the situation that they're reporting on.
Also, you're dealing with commercial interests.
You have advertisers.
You have all these different things that have a say or at least an influence on what gets said, whereas you don't have that.
There's also the difference between Broadcast and selective media.
unidentified
That's true.
joe rogan
You have a selective media outlet, which means someone finds out about Josh Zeps from one of your many wonderful appearances all throughout the world and HuffPost Live and all these different things.
They get to know you.
I like this guy's perspective.
He's very intelligent.
He's very articulate.
And then they seek you out.
And then they find your thing.
They subscribe to it.
And then they go to it because they're becoming a Josh Zeps fan.
Whereas...
CNN, it's at the fucking airport.
I'm waiting for my flight the other day and they have CNN. And they're showing these people doing these things and it's on.
There's a difference between something that's broadcast and something that you select.
And I think when someone gets excited about something like what you do is someone who has chosen to go seek out your perspective and your point of view.
It's very difficult to do that on a show like CNN or a network like CNN. We have to be able to do better than we are, though.
josh szeps
Because, like, 60 Minutes, for all of its faults, occasionally hits the nail on the head and does a good job, and certainly used to, and people watch it and watched it.
I mean, Cronkite used to do it.
They do a great job.
I mean, PBS does a great job.
Broadly, I think NBC News does a great job, just as a whole collection.
joe rogan
Brian Williams.
unidentified
Cough, cough.
josh szeps
With the exception of Brian Williams.
Although, I mean, like, who gives a fuck?
He's just a voice.
Yeah, exactly.
joe rogan
He could be a robot.
He might as well be a robot.
josh szeps
That's right.
Who gives a shit what he'd do?
joe rogan
Get Siri to do his job.
That's what they should do.
unidentified
Exactly.
joe rogan
They should just have a fucking laptop there.
josh szeps
But here's...
On your point about what people are going to watch and seek out, there's a good piece in Vox by Max Fisher after all the criticism of why didn't the media cover the Beirut bombings.
Because one of the most retweeted tweets the day after the Paris attacks was a tweet about why is the media covering this so much when they didn't cover Beirut.
And so Max Fisher says...
We did, and nobody clicks on it.
unidentified
Oh.
josh szeps
We do, and nobody ever clicks on it.
joe rogan
So because no one clicks at it, or no one clicks on it, then they just let it go?
josh szeps
Well, at some point, if you're interested in having a thriving media business, you have to give people what they actually want, which is judged by what they click on.
That's where it's fucked.
So they put Beirut at the very top of the page, and then, you know what, it doesn't even register as a blip on the number of clicks.
So then they downgrade it, and it ends up falling back onto the world section of the site.
joe rogan
But I think you just nailed it, because it's a business, and that's where it becomes a problem.
What becomes a problem is that it's an entertainment business.
Like, CNN is an entertainment network.
josh szeps
Yeah.
joe rogan
But they entertain you by showing you the real reality TV, which is the news.
But much like reality TV, you know, if you live in a house with a bunch of people and they film six hours a day and then they water it down to 44 minutes on television or 22 minutes on television, when they do that, I mean, they're going to do it the way they want to show it.
They're going to chop out a bunch of other shit that you're not really interested in and they're going to paint a picture and they can edit it and paint that picture in a variety of different ways.
But they're going to do it in the way that they think is going to be the most salacious.
It's going to be the most compelling for you to tune in so they can sell you a Toyota truck.
So they can advertise Tide laundry detergent.
That's really what it's all about.
josh szeps
Exactly.
joe rogan
And I think that's a real problem when you combine commerce with the dissemination of information.
josh szeps
Here's the tweet, by the way.
Jack Jones TV. It has a picture of an explosion in Beirut.
No media has covered this, but RIP to all the people that lost their lives in Lebanon yesterday from ISIS attacks.
Let's see how many retweets it's got.
That's been retweeted 57,750 times and liked 43,102 times.
The picture is not from the Beirut attacks.
It's from 2006, during the Israeli war against Hezbollah.
And it's absolutely not true that no media has covered this.
The New York Times covered it.
The Washington Post.
The AP. Hugh Naylor was sent to cover the blasts.
The Economist had a piece on it.
CNN. Even CNN did it.
The Daily Mail.
joe rogan
So that's a fake picture.
That's interesting.
josh szeps
That's right.
That's from nine years ago.
joe rogan
The wrong picture.
That's the picture that Angelina Jouali tweeted, too.
She tweeted it.
josh szeps
Oh, really?
joe rogan
Yeah.
Yeah.
She tweeted it about the Lebanon attacks as well.
So get on the fucking ball, Angelina.
Stop adopting kids.
josh szeps
Those are the tragedy hipsters, right?
joe rogan
Yeah.
Investigate the veracity of the photographs you post, young lady.
How dare she?
Hashtag outraged.
I'm hashtag...
She's hashtag racist.
How about that?
josh szeps
And now I don't know what to talk about Islam as well.
The difficulty is...
I'm afraid of all of the right-wingers taking...
My greatest fear about terrorism is that we end up living in a quasi-fascist state because we overreact so much that every...
I've got a little nephew who's two years old.
When he's 18 and he's travelling around the world like I did, is he going to be able to sit outside in a cafe and...
And relax, or is he going to have to walk through a metal detector every bloody place he goes?
joe rogan
That's a good question.
josh szeps
And is he going to have any privacy, or is the NSA going to spy on everything that he does, and are we going to let it because we're so afraid of having attacks like this?
And is he going to live in a pluralistic society, or are we going to be so...
We're cowed either one way or the other, where either we take our Trump id and oppress Muslims, which only exacerbates the problem, or on the other hand, we become social justice warriors who are like, this has nothing to do with Islam.
Islam is a religion of peace.
There's nothing to see here.
You don't have to worry about the Islamists, which means that we end up with mini-theocracies in our own cities where you basically have illiberal communities that don't respect women's rights and don't respect gay rights.
joe rogan
Not just don't respect, but actively suppress.
I mean, ISIS is throwing gay people off the roofs.
unidentified
Yep.
josh szeps
And I don't know how we talk about...
This is the problem.
We, and by we, I mean people like me who are broadly sympathetic to minority rights and who are broadly pro-civil rights and want everybody to be able to live life however they want to, and I'm pro-high levels of immigration, and I'm not intolerant, I'm not xenophobic...
I'm certainly not racist or Islamophobic, but how do we talk honestly about the fact that at the fringes of Islam there is a big fucking problem and not yield that territory to the right wing?
Because you've got this rise of these right wing...
Can you imagine if there was an election?
There's an election...
There is an election in Paris, in France, next week.
And how many more Paris attacks would you have to have before the National Front, the anti-immigrant racist party, won power?
In Sweden now, the third largest party is a party that wants to close the borders completely.
I mean, you've practically already got that on the GOP side here.
Well, no, not even remotely, actually.
I take that back, because they want to close the illegal border, but they still believe in having moderate levels of...
Yeah, exactly.
They still believe in having people like me come in.
Yes.
joe rogan
White people that speak well with a cool accent, come on over!
Yeah, are you educated?
Sure, come on over.
Probably more educated than we are.
Yeah, I think what we have here is human beings classically react to tragedies and massive events.
We have problems and then we have solutions.
And the solution is being debated, and there's the extreme right-wing I think we're also dealing with people like Trump that are gigantic egos that have these platforms where they want to step up and they want to gather all this attention to themselves and point to themselves as the solution to this issue with their hardline stances.
And I think what's going to happen is Technology, as it becomes more and more pervasive and invasive and as we become more and more symbiotically connected to the ability to express ourselves through phones and through the internet, I think the next level of this is ultimately going to be some level that allows people to communicate in a way that it's not just typing things down and it's not just watching a video online.
I think we're going to be able to communicate with each other in some sort of a neural transmitting manner.
There's going to be some next step level of technology, whether it's a decade from now or two decades from now.
It's going to seem pointless.
To have phones.
The idea of having a physical thing where you have to go to in order to access information is going to seem absolutely ridiculous.
And once that happens, we're going to see what we see right now in the world where I think I think, regardless of how crazy the world is, I think, at least in America right now, this is absolutely the safest time ever.
When all the social justice warrior shit that we're seeing, and all this craziness about outrage and hashtag racism and hashtag this and that...
It's bad, but it's good.
It's good because it's all about sensitivity.
It's good because it's all about inclusion.
It's good because it's all about eliminating anything that's disparaging or racist or anything where you are marginalizing groups based on something that they can't control, like what they look like or their sexual preference.
And I think as we get deeper and deeper into this interconnectivity that we're experiencing right now, We're going to absolve a lot of our differences and grievances through our ability to communicate with each other and connect with each other.
And I think we're experiencing like this adolescent sort of angst before we get out of the fucking house and go out onto our own.
I mean, we're becoming adults as a civilization.
And along the way, we're experiencing...
The fucking teenage hormonal rage that, you know, a 14 year old has when they're still trapped in their parents' house.
The freedom that human beings are going to have in the future to communicate and express themselves is going to negate a lot of this hashtag college racism or hashtag college activism.
I think what that's coming from is this feeling that a lot of people have that their ideas and their opinions aren't Black lives matter!
unidentified
Black lives matter!
joe rogan
Black lives matter!
Like, what are they doing?
josh szeps
We have a greater ability now, Joe, to communicate with each other than we ever have already.
joe rogan
But it's so recent.
josh szeps
I mean, I take your point.
We're certainly in the adolescence of our species, and I'm trying to find a way of saying drugs without saying drugs.
But not just drugs, float tanks, meditation, whatever else it is that you do in order to gain a perspective on things that is beyond your own little tribe.
My concern is whether or not there is a direct correlation between upgrading the means of communication, and I'm with you that obviously the way that we currently communicate is going to seem completely antiquated in decades to come, But what we've seen happen when the internet began,
you sound to me a little bit like people who I would listen to in the 1990s who would say, once everyone is online, there's going to be no need for a difference anymore because everyone's going to be able to communicate everything and everyone's going to be able to be exposed to so many different ideas that you're not going to be able to be insular anymore.
You're not going to be able to be parochial anymore, trapped in your own little circle of beliefs.
Because with the internet, everything's going to be available at everyone's fingertips all the time.
unidentified
Who's saying that?
josh szeps
Some people.
Yeah, there were futurists who were saying that.
Of course, what's happened is it's had the opposite effect.
The availability of communication on a widespread scale has actually enabled people to silo themselves into little self-thinking communities of sameness so that we're actually more divided than we've ever been because you can seek out only the information that comports with the way that you see the world.
So I don't think that a technology is necessarily going to drive an awakening.
I think the awakening comes from drugs and spiritual epiphanies, and then the communication can be a tool to enact that.
But I can just as easily see some communication revolution being manipulated by jihadis the way that they currently use the Internet and Twitter to coordinate terrorist attacks.
joe rogan
I don't think it's an either or.
I definitely think that there are groups of insulated people that search for confirmation bias, and they stay within their tribe.
But I think one of the reasons why they're so active now, and there's more of them, is because they're recognizing the inevitable future.
You're not going to be able to insulate yourself in the past.
You better get it in now while you can.
You better stockpile that fucking food, because the famine's coming.
I think what you're going to experience in the future is going to be more and more deterioration of these insulated little tribes.
And I think that that's what we're experiencing when people have to apologize for things they would never have to apologize before.
We were talking about Al Franken saying Rush Limbaugh's a big fat idiot.
That was just a few years ago that he wrote that book, maybe a decade ago.
You can't write that book today.
You couldn't put that book in the shelves.
It wouldn't be supported.
It wouldn't be supported by Barnes& Noble.
You're calling something a big, fat idiot.
It's fat-shaming now.
And I think that this increased outrage is also increased sensitivity.
It's also increased understanding.
And once the dust settles in the argument, then people have to, like, you have to take into consideration the validity of other people's opinions.
Like, whether or not you agree with them or not, you have to understand that it's just a matter of this broad range of people expressing themselves.
It'll slowly, like, come down to an understandable vibration.
josh szeps
I hope so.
And let's just unpack two things that we're talking about so we're not conflating two things, right?
One is the social justice warrior debate here in the United States and the other is Islamism.
And we're sort of kind of having two parallel conversations about that at the same time.
In terms of social justice warriors in the United States, I hope that you're right that what they think that they're doing is being an extension of the great traditions of civil rights in America.
In other words, that they're being motivated by a sense of understanding, as you say, and of compassion.
And of outrage against what they perceive as being outrageous injustice.
My concern is that what they're also doing is buying into a long tradition of intolerance and a lack of respect for pluralism and for other people's ideas about things, for other people's right to express ideas that they regard as being I mentioned earlier this study that I thought you were going to like that I bought.
Let me just find it because it's good.
So there's this professor called April Kelly Wozner, and she's a professor of political science at Elizabethtown College.
And she's got a chapter in this new paper called The End of the Experiment, The Rise of Cultural Elites and the Decline of America's Civic Culture.
And it's this study, which is called the General Social Survey.
Which looks at how tolerant or intolerant particular demographics of Americans are, right?
So they start by...
Hang on, I've got tangled up in my microphone here.
I was getting too relaxed listening to you talk.
I was like kicking back.
I was like getting out the popcorn, listen to Joe.
So in the general social survey, they propose a bunch of different groups and they ask people how much they would like or dislike that group of people, right?
Just to establish who we really, really don't like.
The least liked group included in the survey was Muslim clergymen who preach hatred against the United States, right?
That's understandable.
And the second least liked group among Americans are people who believe that blacks are genetically inferior.
So racists.
So then they ask people how tolerant they would be towards a person from that class of people giving a public speech in their community.
And people in their 40s are more tolerant than people in their 30s, and people in their 30s are more tolerant than people in their 20s.
For people in their 40s, the proportion who say that a Muslim clergyman who preaches hatred against the United States should not be allowed to give a public speech is 43%.
People in their 30s, 52%.
People in their 20s, 60%.
So if tolerance means not like, oh, I support black rights or I support gay rights or I support trans rights, but if it means respecting the right of someone who you really disagree with to express that opinion, Well,
joe rogan
I think what you're saying, though, is they're less willing to accept hate speech, which they think are dangerous...
Shorts of conversations.
They think that someone who's a Muslim clergyman who wants to express the hate of America, it's dangerous because he could promote terrorist attacks.
Someone who thinks that black people are genetically inferior to white people is dangerous because they could promote racism or they could promote someone confirming their racist beliefs and then instead of Becoming educated or becoming enlightened.
They go with their initial racist instincts and they go, I was right.
You know, the white man is superior, you know, and they're worried about hate.
josh szeps
Right, but where does that end?
joe rogan
Both those things are about hate.
josh szeps
Well, is Meryl Streep's t-shirt saying better a rebel than a slave about hate?
Because it is to a lot of people in their 20s.
joe rogan
How many people?
How many people?
josh szeps
Well, enough people that she has to put out a press release about.
joe rogan
I think...
josh szeps
Like, I don't think there's anything...
I think we are better off living in a society where bad ideas are exposed to conversation.
I mean, you know, sunlight is the best disinfectant.
You want bad ideas out there.
You want a big roiling conversation.
joe rogan
Yeah.
josh szeps
Where people who are stupid or have ridiculous ideas about the genetic inferiority of black people are able to be exposed, be argued with, be contended.
Because racists aren't just going to go away if you ban them from talking.
They're going to go underground.
They're going to find other communities.
They're going to increasingly self-segregate into their own little communities online.
You want...
I think you want free speech to be a big, roiling debate.
You don't want to be censorious and judgmental and intolerant towards people whose ideas you disagree with.
You want to take them on and expose why those ideas are wrong, and hopefully through that intellectual wrestling match, you all end up progressing forward.
You don't progress forward by simply banning ideas that you think are objectionable.
joe rogan
That's agreed.
That's a very important point.
I think what they're worried about, though, is these people going to schools and indoctrinating very gullible or very impressionable young people.
And that's a legit thing because they themselves have been— But that reinforces the gullibility, right?
unidentified
Yes.
josh szeps
Because you haven't been exposed.
joe rogan
That's what I was going to say, is that they themselves have been indoctrinated into the idea of liberalism and liberal thinking by, like, charismatic people with interesting ideas that they believe in wholeheartedly, and they're very confident in what they're saying, and they speak very well.
Those ideas become infectious.
And sometimes those...
I've expressed this before on the podcast that I listen to these Islamic clergymen speak.
And although I have zero desire to become a Muslim, there's something intoxicating about people that are extremely confident about their ideology.
And that's dangerous for people.
It's dangerous even with a person like me, who's done a lot of fucking drugs, who does a lot of meditation, is involved in martial arts.
I'm a free thinker.
I'm a non-theistic sort of a thinker.
But I watch these people have these conversations with these massive crowds.
And they're saying all these crazy things about Islam being the truth.
And I feel an understanding why people would be drawn to that.
I'm not saying that I'm drawn to it myself, but I understand it.
I feel the compelling idea behind someone joining a group like that.
josh szeps
I think that's right.
I think it's because certainty is intoxicating, right?
joe rogan
Yes, yes.
josh szeps
If you're discombobulated, if the world is complicated, if you don't know what to make of shit, especially if you're in a situation where you feel like you've been shat on for a lot of time, which is what a lot of these followers of these extremists do feel like, then it's nice to just have clarity.
It's nice to just have someone who knows what the truth is and who knows what the right path is.
joe rogan
A perfect example of that is country music.
I guarantee you...
If you'd asked me to list five things that you were going to end that sentence with, country music would not have been top 50. I know a lot of people that I love dearly that like country music, and they read the least out of all the people that I know.
All the people that I know that are really into really dumb country music, these motherfuckers aren't aware of shit that's going on in the world.
I have good friends that I love, but I have to talk to them, especially from the hunting world.
Like, the hunting world is goddamn hilarious, because I've somehow or another become a part of this world, because I've expressed this idea that I think is very important, and we should be aware of where our food comes from, and I've become someone who gathers their food from a hunting way.
But then you connect yourself with these people that are also in this, which become very religious.
There's a lot of religion, but it's a weird kind of religion.
It's almost like a hashtag activist sort of religious idea, where they don't understand the texts.
Like, they'll have religious tattoos.
tj kirk
Like, hey fucker, you gotta read the whole book.
joe rogan
Like, the book says, don't tattoo yourself.
Just like it says, don't Don't blow guys.
I've had arguments with people about homosexuals.
josh szeps
It's pretty much more explicit about the don't get a tattoo than don't blow a guy.
The blow a guy bit is always nebulous about lying with another man or something.
joe rogan
How about we don't lie down?
josh szeps
But the no tattoo.
joe rogan
How about the guy gets on his knees and sucks my dick?
unidentified
What's the problem here?
joe rogan
There's no lying.
Yeah, the tattoo thing is very clear, but when I got into it with these people was when that woman from Kentucky wouldn't marry gay people, and I wrote this piece on Instagram and Facebook, and it got millions of likes, and all these people traded it back and forth, and I got all this blowback from the hunting community, because all these people that are really into God, or really into religion, and then they're also recognized...
Getting pressure, my friends who are in the hunting community were getting pressure to talk to me about my stance on God.
Like, this is hilarious.
Like, how much do you guys actually know about the scripts?
How much have you guys read?
How much do you know about the origins of the scripts?
And it turns out, very little.
Most of them, very little.
But there's this need to simplify things that appear to be very complex.
And the way to simplify things is to put it all in God's hands.
It's all about Jesus.
You know, Jesus said, well, I'll tell you why.
I want to vote for him because he's on Jesus' side.
josh szeps
Well, this comes back to the problem of tribalism that we were alluding to earlier in the show, right?
That there is no greater way of encouraging people to be tribalistic than religion or political affiliation loosely understood, right?
joe rogan
Right.
josh szeps
So there's – you know Dan Carlin's history podcast?
unidentified
Sure.
joe rogan
Man, I love that guy.
josh szeps
Hardcore history.
joe rogan
He's the best.
josh szeps
Oh, just incredible.
Have you had him on the show?
joe rogan
Oh, yeah, a bunch of times.
josh szeps
Oh, fantastic.
I missed those episodes.
I'll go back and listen to him.
joe rogan
Love the shit out of that dude.
josh szeps
I've just been listening.
I've almost finished getting through his World War I thing, which is like five episodes of three and a half hours each.
This is like Rogan-esque duration podcasts.
joe rogan
But way more produced.
It's brilliant.
There are audiobooks.
josh szeps
It's incredible.
It's like a 20-hour explanation of the First World War.
It's just so fascinating.
joe rogan
So good.
josh szeps
So one of the things that he's talking about is when he's talking about the Balkans, He's saying, like, when the Balkans imploded in the 1990s and we had the collapse of Yugoslavia and, you know, Bosnia and Serbia and all that, he's like, you go there even to this day and you talk to a Bosnian Muslim or you talk to a Serb or you talk to a Croat...
About the problems that they've endured, and every single one of them will point a finger at the other groups and say, they've been doing this to us for so long, and back in this day they did that, and then they did that, and then they did that.
It's like the Israelis and the Palestinians or something.
It's like, oh, well, you know, 10,000 fucking years ago my ancestors got massacred by blah-de-blah.
And it's so easy to think of ourselves in terms of aggrieved groups, whether or not Yeah.
is sort of a weird parallel that I'm drawing just as I'm only sort of thinking this up right now, but there is a parallel between jihadis and social justice warriors in the sense that they each are able to take an off-the-shelf, pre-packaged kind of identity and set of beliefs about things and gain certainty from it and be part of a tribe pre-packaged kind of identity and set of beliefs about things and gain certainty from it and be part of a tribe and be part of a community and be fighting the good fight against people who disagree with them, who hold beliefs that they believe are objectionable, whether that belief is that the West is at war with Islam, which is what jihadis think
Whether that belief is that the West is at war with Islam, which is what jihadis think that we want, or whether the belief is that racism is okay, which is what social justice warriors think that all white people think.
Right?
There are these easy, off-the-shelf categories, so think independently, people!
joe rogan
Think independently is a good idea.
I don't know if I'm with you on that one, though.
Social justice worries and the jihad.
I see where you're going with it.
I mean, it's...
josh szeps
They're worldviews that are self-reinforcing, and they're cliques that are self-supporting, right?
So you don't have to ask a lot of difficult questions.
joe rogan
Right.
I totally understand what you're saying.
In that sense, I think extreme liberalism is, in a sense, like extreme conservatism, is a religion, in a sense.
Yeah.
josh szeps
It's an ideology.
joe rogan
Ideologies are very dangerous.
Ideologies where you have locked into a predetermined pattern of thinking that you just have to conform to, I think becomes very problematic for people because the world is fluid.
There's a lot going on, a lot of weirdness to it.
There's also an issue in communication through language and communication through words and the ability to express yourself through words.
It's sometimes difficult because what you're trying to do is you're trying to express intent.
You're trying to get someone to understand how you think and view things.
And you're trying to say, well, why don't you express and view yourself like I do?
Or why don't you see things how I do?
And maybe you're talking to someone who has a completely different idea of what those words mean and completely different idea of the context of this particular scenario that you're discussing.
It's hard.
josh szeps
It's clumsy, isn't it?
joe rogan
Very clumsy.
josh szeps
It's difficult because you've got this kind of platonic ideal in your head of what you want to communicate.
And then you have to just rummage around in the Scrabble bucket for the closest approximation to what it is that you're trying to impart.
joe rogan
That's why podcasts are so unique in a way because, you know, one of the beautiful things about it is that, you know, you do sort of search for the correct way to, I mean, you hear us do this sometimes where this is like...
Yeah.
And what we're doing is we're just trying to figure out what's the best way for me to express this idea that I've got bouncing around in my head where I'm trying to understand how this thing sort of lays out to everybody else.
Like, how do I broadcast it?
unidentified
it?
joe rogan
How do I get it out there in a way where you know what I'm actually saying, what I'm actually thinking, instead of getting outraged as something that's not what I meant, like this Meryl Streep thing?
That's not what she meant.
She obviously didn't mean, I don't want to be a slave, like I want to be a black person in the 1800s.
josh szeps
Exactly.
And there are certain triggers that are really hard for people to get beyond in communication, but we have to find a way to get beyond.
I think the most pressing form of communication that we have to grapple with now is how do we speak to the Muslim community and to one another about the Muslim community and about jihadism without either being bigoted towards Muslims or pretending that there isn't a problem of Islamism that has some relationship to the Muslim community and that has some relationship to the text of right?
Because the moment I say anything remotely Like, the day after the Charlie Hebdo attacks in Paris, Howard Dean went on Morning Joe on MSNBC and said, these guys are about as Muslim as I am.
Well, that's bullshit.
I mean, that's obviously not true.
They're arguably a lot more Muslim than most Muslims.
I mean, they are very fanatically Muslim.
At least they think they are.
So we can't keep litigating whether or not they're theologically correct or whatever.
There is obviously a cancer at the extremist fringe of Islam that has to be dealt with and has to be talked about.
And the more we just talk about it, the more the left talks about it in terms of, well, it's just a problem of extremism in all faiths.
It's got nothing to do with the faith.
the less able we are to actually have a conversation about what needs to be done and how to win over moderate Muslims and how not to alienate them.
Because if tolerant people can't talk about it, then the only people talking about the problem are right-wing xenophobes or fascists, right?
And so what we have to do is find a way, when we talk about, like, those off-the-shelf ideologies, whether it's jihadism or social justice warriorism, we have to find a way to win over moderate Muslims and make them not feel like they're being alienated and judged.
We have to not be, you know, sending southwest flights back to the gate as it was the other day because two people were speaking Arabic.
And watching a video about what's going on in the wake of the Paris attacks or something, and people freaked out because they think all Arabs are terrorists or something.
We have to make sure that doesn't happen, but we can't have that not happen as long as everyone is pretending that there's not a problem with Islam.
Right?
At the edge of Islam.
And I don't know how to have that conversation without sounding like I'm intolerant.
joe rogan
You just gotta keep talking.
Everybody's gotta keep talking.
The arguments against it come up, you talk about the arguments against it, and it just takes time.
I really do believe that.
I believe it just takes a lot of discourse, takes a lot of communication, and the clumsy type of communication that you get through language, through talking.
I think the more this happens, the more this gets discussed, the more people gain an understanding, And again, like we're looking at people aging or like trees growing, it is a slow process.
That in the middle of it, it doesn't seem like any progress is happening at all.
But ultimately, if you look at the world today versus the world of 10 years ago, you see a big difference between what Al Franken was able to publish with that book and what you're able to get away with today.
And I think that sort of, in a weird way, for lack of a better analogy, it highlights the growth that's going on.
It highlights this very strange era that we are currently experiencing.
And with that, let's end this and do your podcast.
We're going to keep talking, folks, but we have to end this.
Because I've got to pick up my kid in a little bit.
But we're going to do an episode of We the People Live.
Hashtag We the People Live.
josh szeps
Hashtag We the People Live.
joe rogan
Josh Zapp's podcast.
And it is available on iTunes.
josh szeps
And SoundCloud.
Or you can just follow us on Twitter at WTP underscore live.
joe rogan
Underscores.
With these fucking underscores.
josh szeps
I know.
Some other boss had got WTP live.
I don't know what it is.
joe rogan
Couldn't you just get we the people, the whole thing, or is that too many letters?
josh szeps
I think it was too many letters.
I don't even remember.
joe rogan
Okay.
All right.
We're going to do that, and then we'll be back.
But Josh Zeps on Twitter.
Follow him.
He's fantastic.
And we're going to do his podcast.
And that's it, you fucks.
And we'll be back tomorrow with Bill Burr.
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