Knowledge Fight Interactive Search Tool

All Episodes

Previous Next

Dec. 29, 2020 - The Podcast of the Lotus Eaters

01:25:10

The Podcast of the Lotus Eaters #34

Large

Audio Only |

Scroll

Time	Text
	Welcome to the podcast of the Lotus Eaters for the 29th of December 2020.
	I think that's right.
	I'm Callum.
	I'm joined by Josh today.
	Hello.
	We're going to be talking about the Nashville bombing, Frankie Boyle's meltdown.
	Well, I'm going to say it's a meltdown, to be honest, in his mental faculties over the last few years.
	I'll definitely say so, yeah.
	And the disappointing response Trump has had to the stimulus bill in which he has now signed it, which is a shame.
	Sorry, is the microphone a little bit far away?
	Oh, John wants me to plug.
	Yeah, so if you go to the Lotus Eaters and sign up now, we have something coming, which John's been working very hard on, so he wants me to plug it, which is the making of video, so it's a behind-the-scenes how we set up the office and that sort of thing.
	So if you want to see that, go and sign up to the website.
	It'll be live 2pm, if that's right.
	Yeah, that's right.
	Okay, so let's get right into it.
	So, the Nashville bombing.
	So this was on Christmas Day, a truck just blew up in Nashville out of nowhere.
	Well, it was an RV, and supposedly it was around 6.30 in the morning on 2nd Avenue and Commercial Street, and it injured three people, but I think as of yet, they've only found the remains of one person, which they've managed to identify as Anthony Warner, I believe, and...
	people who are injured is nothing severe and the police were managed to evacuate beforehand because there was a blaring siren that was saying beware there's about to be a bomb that's going to go off supposedly about 15 minutes beforehand and I think the intention of the siren going off from the RV was to clear away all the people
	just so that there would be damages to businesses and supposedly lots of businesses have been damaged including an AT&T building which was supposedly the main target and also there was lots of collateral damage with I believe, a tattoo parlour being severely damaged and the owner said that the damage is essentially irreparable to the business.
	So it was a major explosion and they're saying that it's definitely deliberate.
	So the fact that he's had that siren going tells you he wasn't trying to target people?
	Yeah.
	So how did they get to the AT&T building, being the target from that?
	Well, it was where the actual RV detonated, so it was driving around for quite some time, and because of the warning, everyone was moving away from it, no one was trying to stop it, so they're assuming that...
	You know, it was his plan to explode the RV there.
	And if I get onto it a bit later, they say that he actually has links to AT&T and he has a motivation.
	Like he has links to ISIS. Sorry.
	Yeah, I did make it sound a bit bad, but no.
	He has reason to be distrustful of AT&T. So far, they're still looking for members of the public to give more information about it, and they're still looking into it.
	I think the actual message that they said was, evacuate now, there is a bomb, a bomb is in this vehicle, the vehicle will explode.
	Would you be able to get the video up?
	So, this is the video of what went on.
	Yeah.
	Yeah, so you can hear the siren saying, get away from it. so you can hear the siren saying, get away from Yeah, and I think you'll get to see the explosion as well, which is going to be very loud, so beware.
	Headphone users.
	Did the camera cut out?
	It did.
	It goes white, but you can't see it on the screen for some reason.
	I think that's enough.
	That hurts my ears now.
	Yeah, so that's Christmas Day for a lot of these people, so I have to...
	Yeah, they only actually managed to get to see their businesses today.
	The whole area had been cordoned off, so they're only recently kind of tallying the damages, so we don't actually know the full extent to the damages caused to all the businesses there.
	But we do know at least that only Anthony Warner was killed in the attack.
	That's the bomber, I presume.
	Yeah.
	And...
	There was also a song being played, which was Downtown by Petula Clark, which the opening lyric is, when you're alone and life is making you lonely, and then it goes...
	Downtown!
	Yeah, there we go.
	I didn't know.
	I had to listen to it beforehand.
	Okay.
	It seems to be giving away his motivation a little bit there.
	It seems like it's an attack of someone who had nothing left to live for, and I'll get on to why I think that in a minute.
	Yeah, it doesn't sound very political.
	No, although, I mean, the fact that he's targeted AT&T, there was a link to Dominion being audited by AT&T, wasn't there?
	But supposedly, the FBI doesn't seem to think it's motivated by that necessarily.
	And also, the Nashville AT&T weren't actually the ones doing it.
	So they think that that theory can kind of be written off.
	So that's sort of a leftist theory that he's some kind of Trump supporter who's bombing Trump?
	Yeah, but there's no evidence to suggest that yet.
	And there is more evidence to suggest that he might be a kind of 5G conspiracy theorist, though, because...
	AT&T were responsible for the rollout of 5G and there are people who had worked with him that had suggested that he was into conspiracy theories but there is also kind of a weird conflict where there's a realtor who had worked with him for about five years and he was saying that he was a really nice guy he would come in and consult and help me with IT and tech and he saw no...
	so there's a weird kind of mismatch between what some people have said about him in his career and perhaps people who knew him in private, like his neighbour said that he was a conspiracy nut like his neighbour said that he was a conspiracy nut and he was really into all different kinds of conspiracies, so it's difficult to know who to take, but it's a fairly feasible argument
	So it's difficult to know who to take, but it's a fairly feasible argument to say that he kept his beliefs very quiet in his work life and perhaps was more open about it in his private life.
	But it's difficult to say as of yet.
	But...
	If we have a look at the BBC video, you can see that there are police just kind of hanging around, waiting to see what's going to happen.
	So this is another video we're going to play?
	Yeah.
	It's just loading, sorry.
	Oh, I had a bit of trouble loading this BBC video up for some reason.
	Not playing?
	Well, okay then.
	So, the police officers are just standing around.
	Oh, here we go.
	So, he's kind of just wandering around.
	This is when the siren's actually going off, so you can see that they're not taking it very seriously.
	And, uh...
	As you can see, if that guy hadn't walked away when he did, he might have got hit by some debris there.
	So I think the police didn't really know what they were reacting to on the ground and I believe quite a few of them were evacuating buildings and disregarding their own safety just to try and clear people out, which I'll go into a bit more later.
	So, just to reiterate, they have matched the DNA of Anthony Warner with DNA found outside of the zone, so they know for certain it is him that carried out the attack.
	I know a couple of days ago they were speculating, but we can confirm it is him now.
	And they also believe it was intentional.
	I mean, especially with the size of the blast, it's very difficult to say, okay, this was an accident because it's affected a huge portion of the street.
	I'll go onto a map in a minute.
	There he is, pictured there.
	I believe he's 63.
	I think he worked as an IT consultant.
	And if we go on to the explosion location, I'll show you roughly where it is.
	You can see here that's where it exploded next to the AT&T building there.
	And if you could zoom out a little bit maybe, you can see...
	The BBC video that we just watched, the police officer was walking at the top there, and then you can see the tattoo shop at the top there, so this was clearly a huge blast if this tattoo shop was damaged beyond repair, and it's essentially covered a huge portion of that street, so it really puts into perspective how significant it was.
	And...
	So what do you think is a 5G conspiracy theorist?
	Well, I think partly his background in tech was part of the reason why the FBI was investigating it, because I believe there were some local Nashville news stations that were So
	focusing on the 5G conspiracy side of things.
	They weren't investigating any other angle.
	They weren't investigating even whether it was just a suicide attempt.
	It was purely that.
	So the FBI are pretty convinced that that's the reason.
	I seem to think so, yeah.
	And from what I've gathered from the statements from some of the neighbours and people who worked with him, that's kind of corroborated by what they've said as well.
	Sorry, I've got a really dry freight.
	No, that's fine.
	It's Christmas, I've not been there.
	Too healthy.
	So, Donald Cochran said, the US Attorney for Tennessee said, we've come to the conclusion that the individual named Anthony Warner is the bomber, and he was present when the bomb went off, and he perished in the bombing.
	And he said the...
	Warners' home was in nearby Antioch and was searched by federal agents on Sunday.
	They still don't know his motive and it's too early for this to be discussed publicly.
	Apparently, according to some people he worked with, he quit unexpectedly in December just via email without providing an explanation.
	And they said that this was really out of character for him and they think that it alludes to some kind of problem in his personal life because he didn't give a reason and because he was so polite in his life.
	That they believed that there was some kind of underlying reason or motivation behind it.
	But supposedly law enforcement have stated that they had no awareness of the guy whatsoever.
	They had no idea that he was going to have an attack, I believe.
	His only charge was a cannabis charge in 1978.
	So he's pretty much off the radar as far as the police are concerned.
	And...
	He'd never been monitored or known by the FBI until they actually made the link between his RV and the one used in the attack.
	We've got a statement here saying he is either a criminal mastermind or a dude who flew completely under the radar.
	One law enforcement official stated that he sounded like an extremely sad guy who wanted to die in an elaborate fashion on Christmas Day.
	I think that is also a good point, that it happened on Christmas Day, which seems to suggest that there's some kind of...
	Was it maximised attention or something like that?
	I think it's a bit more poetic.
	I think that's just me as a psychologist speculating his mindset, but I think the fact that it's...
	Oh, because he's lonely.
	Yeah, he's lonely on Christmas Day, and the opening lyrics saying...
	About being lonely and going downtown.
	It seems to be that he's giving away his motivation by playing that song.
	Or at least that's my speculation.
	Obviously we don't know his motivation for certain yet.
	But that would fit.
	Yeah, I think it would fit.
	I think the explanation provided that he was a lonely guy.
	He wasn't married, didn't have any kids.
	He lived alone.
	Apparently, he gave away his property in his car to his ex-girlfriend, I believe.
	I think a week before the attack was carried out and there's also news that he had been given a cancer diagnosis so I think it's the circumstantial evidence seems to point very strongly that this was some kind of extreme send-off and although it's too early to speculate on the 5G stuff I think there's Certainly reason to believe that the FBI's line
	of inquiry might come up with something interesting, particularly because it was the AT&T building that was targeted most severely.
	Because supposedly about 75% of all of the AT&T networks affected by the blast were back up on Sunday, but in the local area, all of their networks went out for a period of a few days.
	So it was quite a significant attack, and it clearly had an effect on the local area, but perhaps not to the extent that he might have hoped.
	Yeah.
	So, the Sunday Times reported that Warner, a week prior to his suicide attack, told his ex-girlfriend that he had cancer, and that was why he was giving away his stuff.
	He just said to her that he was going to spend a week in the woods, staying in a cabin or something, I assume, with his dogs, and he didn't give anything away about his intentions to carry out this attack.
	There have been lots of statements looking at...
	The response of the police, and they've been saying that the police have perhaps put themselves in danger far more than they should have, but, for example, the mayor described them as heroes for doing so because they were kind of instrumental in clearing the area in the attack.
	So they were knocking door to door and trying to clear people out of buildings, making sure none of them were within the blast radius.
	Although, as you can see from that BBC video, they...
	Some of them not taking it that seriously.
	Yeah.
	To be fair, if it's just some RV making a bunch of noise, it's not necessarily a bomb.
	If it was myself, I'd be like, whatever.
	You're not actually expecting it to blow up.
	I know.
	I think they would have probably viewed it with some kind of speculation, especially as it was happening on Christmas morning as well.
	They thought maybe this was just someone making a bad joke or something.
	And they were also, at the same time, responding to a shots fired call.
	So I think that they viewed the RV driving around playing this message as secondary to the shots fired call, which had diverted a lot of the police attention.
	And if we could go on to some of the responses...
	You can see that people have been responding, as you could probably expect, by trying to point out and win political points by saying that if he were Muslim, people would be asking lots of different questions like who radicalised him.
	Where did he go for his religious services?
	How did he get into the country?
	What videos did he watch?
	Was his family involved?
	But there's the thing, like, they are, and they didn't find a motive, as you're saying.
	Yeah.
	Because I saw some, like, I'm assuming this guy's a leftist, I can see on your notes it says he's Daily Beast columnist, which gives me a hint, but I did see some right-wing things as well, people suspecting that he might be an anti-fire bombing or something like this, but none of that seems to be true.
	It doesn't necessarily seem to be politically motivated.
	It's just a lonely guy who did something stupid.
	Yeah, essentially.
	And although the 5G lead is the main FBI follow-up, there is also a link to him and AT&T, because I believe his father, who later died of dementia, used to work for a company that was taken over by AT&T, and used to work for a company that was taken over by AT&T, and I think he lost his job in 2015, just
	So it might be that he just held some kind of personal grudge towards AT&T, rather than it even being motivated by any kind of ideological motive.
	It's really not quite clear, to be honest.
	All right.
	If we go on to another Muslim activist, he says, No one is asking what church Anthony Warner attended.
	No one wonders why the white community didn't report him for suspicious activity.
	No one asks why white leaders don't denounce this suicide bombing.
	White privilege is being viewed as an individual liable only for yourself.
	What?
	Like, he's a martyr for the white movement or something like this.
	Like the White Liberation Front, the suicide bombing AT&T buildings.
	Yeah, what a terrible take.
	I mean, we have no reason to think it was even political at all, let alone anything like that.
	But this is very typical.
	People just jumping on bandwagons, even when there's no bandwagon to jump on.
	Well, when there are points to be scored, I think people will take any opportunity, whether it's warranted or not.
	This is why I try to not comment on terrorism instances whenever I can, because...
	There's actually a great story of what happened in Spain at the time.
	I think it was a train bombing.
	Someone had blew up a train.
	And the government at the time instantly tried to blame it on Islamic extremism.
	Fact check me if I'm getting this wrong.
	But it turned out it was actually Catalan extremists.
	And then they were able to be like, oh, oh.
	So then the government got it wrong.
	And they lost the subsequent election because it was too embarrassing.
	Like the fact that he tried to jump on a bandwagon that wasn't there.
	I didn't know that.
	I remember vaguely hearing about a Catalan bombing, but I didn't actually look into it very much at the time.
	But it exposes people like this.
	They're not interested in finding what the truth is.
	They're not interested in solving a problem.
	They're just here to put something.
	Because he knew he would be found out wrong if it was wrong.
	So why even put this out, you know?
	It's unnecessary.
	And also, I think people know that they're not going to be held accountable for this sort of thing.
	And they feel like they can get away with it and they can score these cheap political points while they can.
	Just the white community.
	Like, okay.
	I'm sorry we didn't report this guy that no one knows.
	Jesus, sorry.
	You said this had a thing to Dominion.
	Yeah.
	So this was pretty sketchy, but you wanted to mention it.
	It was a really tenuous link, so I would like to clear it up.
	There's no actual evidence so far that's been found that's linked it to Dominion.
	I think it was just speculation as soon as it happened because it targeted the AT&T building who were carrying out some kind of audit on Dominion machines.
	But that's not happening in Nashville.
	So unless he was just...
	Targeting AT&T in general for that, but that's not particularly feasible because that particular one was not being used.
	But that lifeline hasn't been fully gone into yet, whether or not it was AT&T. Yeah.
	Someone mentioned in the chat, imagine if the siren was someone, Allahu Akbar, and then you could make an inference.
	Yeah.
	I love the idea that, you know, his siren would have been...
	God, if he was a white nationalist bomber, I don't know, you will not replace us or something?
	Like, then you'd have a reason to tweet this?
	But no, obviously not, it's just...
	Yeah, I mean, of all of the songs he could have chose as well, I don't think the one he picked would be...
	The one you would go for for supporting that point, would you?
	I want to send a message.
	What are you going to play?
	Downtown.
	Yeah, it seems like a fairly innocuous song, doesn't it?
	Yeah, so a shame, but just one of those things, people do these things, I guess.
	Unless we find out it's got a relation to 5G, in which case...
	I mean, it's still an avenue of speculation, but I think...
	The fact he had a cancer diagnosis, he lived alone, and he gave away all of his stuff to his ex-girlfriend seems to suggest that he was just a depressed guy.
	Maybe he had a grudge against AT&T, but it's too early to say, but at least that's the most promising explanation we've got so far.
	Alright.
	Well, at least it's not political terrorism, which, I mean, if there's a silver lining, that's the silver lining I can tell.
	I'd probably say the silver lining is no one was killed besides him.
	Yes, that as well.
	The more important.
	Anyway, let's move on to, I believe you've got a segment about Frankie Boyle.
	I want to talk about Frankie Boyle, because Frankie Boyle is actually someone I grew up watching, and I really appreciated his comedy.
	And he has just declined in his ability to understand things, in my view.
	And for people who don't know who he is, like, but this is a wider problem.
	So for people who don't know who he is, there's just some links we're going to put on the screen of the most viewed views from Frankie Boyle, so if you can get this up, John.
	Like the first one here, Frankie Boyle, most offensive jokes, ultimate compilation, 1.3 million views.
	So this is the sort of thing.
	I mean, the next one is 4.7 million views, Frankie Boyle, 10 darkest jokes.
	So Frankie's the Scottish comedian who has always done the stuff, you know, testing where the edge is on just the darkest and the most...
	I wouldn't even say he was necessarily testing where the edge is.
	He was jumping over the edge.
	Yeah, he was going very far over the edge in some cases.
	Yeah, and this got him in a lot of trouble back in the day because he did these things.
	And it was great because this is the great part about comedy.
	You don't know where the line is unless someone's jumping over it, right?
	So he was the guy in the room on talk shows like Mock the Week who would jump over the edge and then you'd find where the line is.
	That's sort of part of comedy.
	But one of the things that got him in trouble, and this is early 2000s if I remember correctly, was him making a joke about the Queen.
	So I want to play a video.
	This is a segment in which you have to come up, and the segment is called Things You're Unlikely to Hear from the Queen's Speech, and this is what he gave.
	And in response, the BBC called him up, sorry, called up the Director General and made him answer for this joke, which is just, it's really cringe, but I've got to show you it.
	What the Queen didn't say in her Christmas message.
	What the fuck are you standing?
	I've had a few medical problems this year.
	I'm now so old that my pussy is haunted.
	Let's talk about creative risks then.
	This is a quote from Mock the Week last night.
	BBC 2 just before we came on air.
	This was a section saying, things the Queen would never say in a Christmas special.
	And one comedian said, I'm now so old.
	My pussy is haunted.
	Is that a risk worth taking?
	As I said, we have many programmes in the BBC, on television and on radio.
	What I would say is, to be honest, I would only want to judge any remark on any programme in the context of the programme, watching the programme.
	I think I always find it better to watch programmes myself.
	I'm now so old, my pussy is haunted.
	Why do you keep saying it?
	But yeah, this is just to make the point that Frankie is not afraid to jump over the line, and that was the point in a lot of his comedy.
	It was very nihilistic, very hitting the hard edges, which is the best bits of comedy in my opinion, but I know it's not for everyone.
	And the absurdity of the BBC Newsnight program, calling in the director general and being like, answer for this joke.
	He's made a joke, don't you know?
	It's like, yeah, it's a comedy program.
	That's what it's for.
	But this is...
	This is when I liked him.
	And this is when a lot of comedians like him.
	And the reason comedy has gotten bad, in my view, is this was allowed back in the day.
	This was easy to do.
	You can make jokes about pretty much everyone.
	Frankie did make jokes about 9-11.
	He made jokes about the guy who played the Joker.
	I think he killed himself, didn't he?
	Oh, Heath Ledger.
	Yeah.
	He made jokes about whatever was there.
	He was allowed to take risks, essentially, especially on the BBC, where a lot of other comedians weren't willing to do it.
	He kind of became notorious for the jokes he told.
	If you were to define a controversial comedian, he would have been the go-to.
	Yeah.
	And one of the good ones, in my view, at the time.
	And to find people like that now, you have to go on the internet.
	You can't find them on mainstream TV because they've all been scrubbed.
	And the reason for this is obviously political bias.
	Now, if you say a joke that is politically wrong, oh god, you're in trouble.
	You're going to get cancelled.
	And this happens all the time.
	I mean, we interviewed Alistair Williams about this.
	I think I'm getting his...
	That's his name, isn't it?
	Alistair Williams?
	I don't know if you were there, John.
	Anyway, so he's a great comedian.
	He made one joke about Brexit that was wrong, because he dared to support Brexit.
	And then he just stopped getting bookings.
	I was like, okay, that's...
	That's not even that controversial, didn't like 48% of people...
	Yeah, so imagine you make a joke about...
	So it's like 50-50 vote, and then all of a sudden there's a position that's unacceptable, even though...
	Half of the public voted for it, essentially.
	Yeah, so imagine if it's a joke about transgenderism or race or anything like this.
	You know, these touchy subjects where if you just don't agree with the official narrative, then you're not getting booked again, are you?
	And this is the problem with intersectionality, is it kills comedy.
	It makes sections of comedy off limits for people to talk about.
	And Frankie completely brought into this because he's, I would say, a socialist left-winger, and the socialists have been steamrolled by the intersectionalists, and there's now nothing really left of old-style socialism.
	I mean, you've got George Galloway left, which...
	Is that right?
	Easy to ignore.
	He's just one guy, isn't he?
	Didn't he set up his own political party at one point?
	Yeah, the Workers' Party of Britain, which, if you are left-wing and hate intersectionalism, that would be the place for you.
	But I wanted to play a clip of...
	Because Frankie got his own show in which all he does is now spout intersectional nonsense, and it's really painful to watch.
	I mean, if you like it, that's great.
	You know, you enjoy it.
	I just, you know, I don't think you should be taken down for it, but it was really painful to watch this stuff.
	And I decided to clip probably one of the worst segments that's ever been done that got him a little hot water, which is about killing a whitey, which we'll play the clip, and you can see the level of cringe that this show has.
	Okay, this week's First Motion.
	Black Lives Matter glosses over the complexities of a world where we all need to come together and kill Whitey.
	This is a subject that's important to me because I was actually brought up by a couple of anti-racists.
	My Auntie Margaret and my Auntie Jean.
	Joining us to discuss Earth Motion, please welcome comedian Dane Baptiste.
	How you doing, Dane?
	How you been?
	I've been good.
	I've been good.
	I've been just doing my normal stuff of rationalising my modern existence during the continued genocide of my people, so...
	That's a bit of a strong claim, isn't it?
	Genocide of my people.
	What?
	Like, the black race is being genocided, is it?
	Okay, alright.
	Since when?
	I assume he means by George Floyd and police brutality, but just obvious nonsense.
	Like, obviously untrue.
	Anyway, that's all the rest.
	We've got all the different ideas that have come together now.
	We have all the enemies of YC. A woman with an opinion.
	A black woman with an opinion.
	Even worse, someone of dual heritage and a Celt.
	I mean, worst nightmare right now.
	I have read some James Walden.
	What I find striking every time that I sort of interact with that idea of white power and black power is that those myths, as you were talking about, those capitalist myths are so prevalent today.
	They're so real today.
	Like the myths that we have about Black power, Wakanda, it's still a world where Africa was never colonized, was never pillaged for its resources.
	White power is Trump Tower.
	These things are put against each other, but when we say we want to kill Whitey, we don't really mean we want to kill Whitey, we do.
	But when we say we want to kill Whitey, it's like...
	Not today.
	But when people react to people saying that white privilege, whiteness is a capitalist structure.
	It benefits itself.
	It hurts white people.
	It hurts non-black people.
	It hurts black people.
	But still this kind of fear of a black alternative.
	And it's these sort of rhetorics battled against each other, these extreme capitalist rhetorics of supremacy.
	Yeah, so if your brain hurts after listening to that garbage, you're not the only one.
	But the absurdity of this show is evident.
	I don't think I have to explain it like everyone can see through.
	The fact that it's not a comedy show, really.
	Yeah, where is the comedy there?
	The intersectionality is what he's there for.
	Yeah, he's just using his platform to plug politics by the look of it.
	I mean, he's got a panel that's all favourable to this view.
	He's not challenging it at all.
	He's just kind of sat there.
	Well, he agrees.
	Yeah.
	Yeah.
	But I love that point there from the black guy, I can't remember his name, Baptiste, was saying the point that we have all the enemies of Whitey, and then he said, oh, we've got a woman, enemy of Whitey, okay, black woman, someone of mixed heritage, and then a Celt.
	It's like, okay, so not the enemies of Whitey, the enemies of the English.
	Yeah, essentially.
	It was weird that they all knew the subtext, but they didn't actually say it.
	I mean, they just took it for granted and they knew exactly what he meant, despite the fact that he didn't explicitly state that, which really says it all, doesn't it?
	I mean, there's also the point there with the lady, I don't want to call her a comedian, but female comedian making the joke that, you know, we don't want to kill whitey, we do.
	And it's obviously a little bit of a play.
	I'm not going to say she genuinely wants to kill white people off the basis of that statement, but she's having a bit of a joke at the fact that, you know, wouldn't it be funny?
	It's also a very provocative thing even to say as a joke.
	And if the tables were turned, there's no way that any white person would be able to get away with saying something like that.
	They would be crucified.
	Because it's far-left intersectionality.
	There's a far-right comedy show on TV joking about the extermination of brown people.
	How long would that stay up?
	It wouldn't.
	It probably wouldn't even exist.
	The least of which is the fact that that's funded by the BBC. That's a BBC show.
	So that's funded by taxpayer money.
	Some nice taxpayer-funded racism.
	That's nice.
	I'm sure you're enjoying it, Frankie.
	But this is the point where it's like, when you mix intersectionality with comedy, you end up with shit like that.
	It's not good.
	It's not even entertainment value, in my opinion.
	Sorry, try not to.
	Getting told off.
	Anyway, so Frankie has now gone on and he's given an interview with Louis Theroux.
	Louis Theroux is a very famous documentary filmmaker.
	He tries to be fair in everything he does and he should be appreciated for that because he does a reasonable job.
	Is that giving him enough credit?
	No, I think he's...
	I think that's a fair statement.
	He's interviewed loads of controversial figures and kind of given them at least a platform to explain themselves, even if he does explicitly say he doesn't agree with them.
	He's met Scientologists, white nationalists, black nationalists.
	I think he met some Islamic extremists at one point.
	I know he met the Westboro Baptist Church as well.
	That was one of the most famous ones, I think, wasn't it?
	Yeah, so he's a pretty intelligent guy.
	And Frankie gave...
	So he wanted to ask Frankie, as anyone would, well, how can you stand there and talk about free speech all the time when...
	Well, not all the time, but the fact that you get away with this stuff, and yet you don't seem to understand what you're doing is just as bad.
	So if you're pushing intersectionality, you constantly need to cancel and censor people for saying things that are on PC, obviously.
	Well, in which case, how on earth are you in this position?
	Because all of your career, at least the thing that skyrocketed your career for most people, and why most people know you, is because the most offensive jokes you've ever told are also the funniest jokes you've ever told.
	So, I wanted to play the first clip from this, in which he asked Frankie about council culture, and Frankie's response is just weird.
	There's another one I was going to run by you, another quote.
	This one's from Todd Phillips, who directed Joker, and he was on the record as saying...
	He made Joker a superhero film because he couldn't make comedies anymore, he said.
	You know, he'd made the Hangover films and other comedies before that.
	He said, go try to be funny nowadays with this woke culture.
	There were articles written about why comedies don't work anymore.
	I'll tell you why.
	Because all the fucking funny guys are like, fuck this shit.
	I don't want to offend you.
	Yeah, I mean, I just, I don't feel that.
	I don't feel culture is too woke.
	I don't feel comedy is too woke.
	You know, I think a lot of that pressure comes from the right.
	A lot of it comes from the mass media.
	And it's largely just as a way of generating column inches.
	You know, I don't think they're genuinely offended at some of that stuff.
	Yeah, firstly, sorry for the swearing.
	If anyone's bothered by that, there's probably going to be some more.
	I didn't have time to clip it all, but the point that cancel culture or the fact that, you know, this guy who directed The Joker is complaining, if you want to make comedy these days, you've got to be woke, and it's unbearable because it kills comedy, obviously, because it's not funny.
	And then Frankie's response is, no, that's the right's fault.
	The right wing has done this.
	It's like...
	I don't know how he can say that.
	I mean, it's not the right that is calling for the cancellation of anyone, really, isn't it?
	The pro-free speech side of the debate, really.
	It's just too absurd to have been like, you know, SJWs and things like this, they're all voting Tory, aren't they?
	They're all voting Republican.
	No, of course not.
	His argument is probably, if I give him a charitable interpretation, is that the right-wing press loves to make fun of SJWs and far-left intersectionalist nonsense because it's funny.
	Like, they come out with the most absurd takes, and they're saying it with a straight face, like, yeah, this country that has a black president is a white supremacist country.
	Like, really?
	Really?
	Okay.
	And so, of course, the right-wing press, whenever someone says something that's stupid, obviously wants to publish it, and when they say things like, oh, I don't know, this TV show has to be taken down because it doesn't use the correct pronouns because Caitlyn Jenner's changed her gender now.
	Yeah.
	Of course, people are going to laugh at it.
	So his view would probably be that because they're reporting on intersectionalists demanding nonsense, therefore they're creating the bubble which then causes things to be cancelled.
	So is he essentially saying that the media is blowing out of proportion to the actual power that they have to remove content?
	So you'll get a bunch of whining people on Twitter, and then, I don't know, the Daily Mail will write an article saying, oh, these idiots on Twitter have said this thing.
	And then the company will buckle to the pressure.
	And Frankie's saying that the pressure is coming actually from the Daily Mail and not the people on Twitter.
	But then I have to wonder, because the next article I wanted to go up was reporting on Netflix getting rid of Little Britain.
	For people who don't know Little Britain, Little Britain's a wonderful show.
	I'm missing it.
	It's gone downhill.
	There's a bunch of other shows they also took down, but Little Britain's just the funniest and probably the best example to use for this.
	They have two guys who do all the main characters, and both of them are white guys.
	So when they want to play a character who's got brown skin, well, they do hair and makeup.
	Like they do for every other character who's white.
	There's a lot of hair and makeup involved.
	So they had them with, you know, essentially what I assume Frankie would call Blackface.
	Yeah.
	But I don't even want to call it that because it's not really that.
	It's just you have to play a character and the character doesn't have your skin tone.
	What do you...
	I'm pretty sure they do that for every single one of their characters, don't they?
	They always just change their appearance.
	It's part of the running gag in the show, is that they are constantly the same people but changing.
	And part of the humour in it is that, oh wait, that's either Matt Lucas or...
	I remember when I was young, I didn't actually realise that they were the same guy for all of them.
	I thought some of them were different actors, and that's part of the comedy.
	But the point being here that...
	Well, Netflix.
	Netflix has taken down these shows because of right-wing pressure, Frankie.
	Under what circumstance?
	I mean, Netflix here.
	I picked up a random tweet that they put out.
	Known far-right platform, Netflix.
	Like, just always siding with the far-right.
	Always siding with the right-wing.
	No, no left-wing bias there at all.
	Sorry, Daily Siren, in case anyone can hear that.
	More robberies.
	But...
	It's obvious nonsense, but it doesn't get any better.
	So Frankie actually got a lot worse when Louis Theroux asked him about the Mohammed cartoons.
	Because it's like, well look, you obviously have built your career on offensive jokes.
	I'm not saying that's bad, it's actually good.
	It's actually what people need to do.
	And so the offense to Muslims when they see Mohammed cartoons is this reasonable, should we censor it?
	Not a siren, kill me.
	So I think we'll just play the clip and you can get Frankie's answer, which is mind-boggling.
	I think in the background as well, though, people make it a freedom of speech issue.
	So, for example, should it be illegal to show cartoons?
	Because the nth degree here, in some respects, is the cartoons of...
	Mohammed, right?
	Yeah.
	That is something that people have been killed for, you know, terrorist acts, in fact, quite recently.
	So, should it be illegal to draw the cartoons...
	I think you have to think about the effects, don't you?
	So as I've got older, I now think we have to think about the effects there.
	So when you hear people laughing about that subject, you're going to have an instinctive reaction of, oh, this is an attack on me.
	And I think for Muslims as well, a lot of Muslim people are pretty heavily oppressed in Western countries.
	When you see things like us discussing whether it's okay to draw Muhammad, you don't think, well, there's two guys who are Really interested in these intellectual issues, you might just think, you know, that's just that thing again.
	Nuts.
	I mean, absolutely nuts.
	I mean, the first thing that him ending that was saying that if a Muslim guy sees two people discussing whether it's okay, he just sees them as bringing up that thing again.
	As if Muslims are some, you know, this is the bigotry of low expectations, obviously, that Muslim people are not able to understand that an intellectual argument or an intellectual debate is going on.
	They just see that they're being offended and therefore must kill.
	Pretty bigoted way to look at Muslims, Frankie, but okay.
	Isn't that contrary to what the French imams were saying, as in they understood the free speech argument as well in France when Macron was kind of ramping things up to target extremism?
	Even then they understood.
	We're referencing here, obviously, the killing of the schoolteacher who showed the cartoons.
	That's what Theroux was referencing as well.
	But he also mentioned the Muslim reaction, so he's got to think about the consequences of his words.
	Well, what are the consequences of drawing a cartoon that some people don't like?
	Like their feelings are hurt.
	No one's arm gets cut off.
	No one's head gets cut off.
	No buildings get bombed when someone draws a cartoon.
	Feelings get hurt.
	So if that's the standard, Frankie, if feelings being hurt is enough for us to censor things, to make them criminal, you ask them, should the drawing of the cartoons be illegal?
	You're looking at a 9,000 year sentence at least.
	I mean, just for the stuff you said about disabled kids and whatnot.
	Let's not get into all the R-word jokes.
	Yeah, I think no one person got more complaints than Frankie Boyle when he was on the BBC. I think he held the number one spot for a long time, at least...
	Yeah, almost so.
	In the early 2000s to kind of 2010, that sort of period, he was as controversial as you could get a comedian, essentially.
	But also, you shouldn't have the right to draw these cartoons because Muslims in the West are oppressed.
	That was ridiculous.
	I couldn't believe he said that.
	So he wanted to go to the definition of oppression, just so we're clear.
	So, definition here.
	Prolonged cruel or unjust treatment or exercise of authority.
	So...
	I challenge Frankie Boar to tweet out a list of cruel and unjust punishment against the Muslim community from the British state.
	You tell me.
	Which parts of British law are specifically targeting Muslims and being uncruel or unjust?
	You know, tell me.
	And the only thing I could even think of from a left-wing perspective would probably be prevents.
	They'd argue that prevents disproportionately targets Muslim community, and therefore we're being targeted by the state.
	I'd just say, well, terrorism in the UK is disproportionately Islamic.
	See, it's that simple.
	Sorry.
	Like, I don't know what the percentage is, but it's definitely disproportionate.
	It's not 4%.
	The only thing I can think of is maybe things to do with the Iraq War.
	I know he used to make lots of jokes about that and how Tony Blair was a war criminal and things like that.
	And it could be like a loose association with that, although that's not necessarily domestic.
	Muslims in the West are oppressed, so...
	Not too sure, but I get where you're getting there.
	But I wanted to get ahead, because there's a couple more clips.
	So the next one is him being asked about Count Dankula, which Frankie kept his mouth shut throughout the entire ordeal in the UK. I think only Ricky Gervais and David Baddiel said things about Count Dankula that, you know, he shouldn't be prosecuted.
	This is absurd.
	Frankie didn't have the balls to do that.
	He stayed silent.
	And when he did say anything about free speech during the time, he said that the far right were using free speech to promote themselves.
	It's like...
	Okay.
	But here's his response to being asked about Count Dankula.
	While we're on the subject, Mark Meechan is the other one that always comes up, also known as Count Dankula, famously a YouTuber and comedian who supposedly, as a way of getting back at his girlfriend who had a little dog, taught the dog to do a Hitler salute.
	Whenever he said Heil Hitler, put it on YouTube and was prosecuted.
	And it became a kind of cause celebre and sort of a rallying point for comedians in general, but the far right or the right, let's say, for whom it was evidence of kind of political correctness gone mad, I guess.
	Did you take a view on that?
	I don't think someone should be prosecuted for that if they use a free speech defence.
	I read the judgement in the case, and the judge, in that very dry way that Scottish legal people often do, kind of noted that it hadn't really been a free speech defence.
	Like, I think his defence was that he had put it up purely for his girlfriend.
	It was a private message, but he'd put it up on YouTube.
	And his girlfriend hadn't seen it.
	So it was a very poor defence.
	Yeah, I read that too, funnily enough, and I thought, well, that's ridiculous.
	Like, why would you try and defend it on those grounds?
	It's obviously a comedy bit.
	So you thought he was wrongly convicted because of bad defence?
	Yeah.
	I mean, I don't believe in people getting prosecuted for jokes, obviously.
	As David Mitchell said, saying something's not a subject for comedy is like saying it's not a subject for fiction.
	I mean, that's the double thing.
	Like, you said nothing throughout the whole trial.
	You didn't even tweet anything or say anything.
	You know, thank you to Ricky D. Reyes and David Baddiel, because not only did they say things, they tweeted things, they made sure their support was in the right place.
	And Frankie Ball said nothing.
	So he also believes that he shouldn't be prosecuted.
	Well, okay, that's a start.
	But he believes that he shouldn't be prosecuted...
	Only if he makes a free speech defense in his court case.
	And the problem here, the reason I wouldn't support someone like this, is because he didn't make a free speech defense, he made a defense on the basis that not many people saw it.
	Which, that's just...
	I think I'm right in saying this, but it's just pure ignorance of the case then to say this.
	Like, you do not know what the problem was here.
	Because the law is that by sending an offensive message over a public communications network, Count Dankula was committing a crime.
	So his defense was, well, I wasn't making this available to the public.
	This was meant to be uploaded to my tiny YouTube channel of what, like five subscribers?
	And I'd show it to my girlfriend and then it would be a big laugh because it'd be like, haha, I did this to the dog.
	And that's it.
	So of course, yeah, his legal defense was on that basis.
	Because guess what?
	There is no free speech defense in the UK to my knowledge.
	Like, you cannot argue, yeah, it was grossly offensive and I did break this law as written, but I was doing it for free speech, therefore you can't get me, judge.
	It's like, no, we don't have a First Amendment.
	That's not a thing.
	Yeah, we don't have a codified constitution.
	It's all kind of in loose legislation and we kind of just have to figure out what our rights are.
	Well, we don't have any.
	That's the problem.
	This is why that judge in England, in response to a case on the exact same law, said this law breaks human rights.
	It does not give you the, I think, even by the UN standard of free speech.
	And the UN standard is pathetic.
	So the fact that he didn't make a free speech defense, Frankie and Louis, is because there isn't one.
	You don't have that under that specific law.
	And then he decided to go after Ricky Gervais.
	And I bet there's a little bit of salt here because Ricky Gervais did come out in defense of Count Dagular and said, look, that's ridiculous.
	It's a joke.
	Who cares?
	And he decided to go after him for his stand-up routine.
	So the last clip, just him going after Ricky Gervais.
	You reminded me of the fact that in the recent special you have a pop at Ricky Gervais.
	Oh yeah.
	Because he has a joke about trans people saying, like, that's like me self-identifying as a chimpanzee.
	And then you say, well, it's like you self-identifying as a stand-up comedian.
	I murdered the joke.
	In fact, I don't think I told the joke.
	But it's along those lines.
	Yeah, you know, that's pretty much, that's the spirit of it.
	That's the spirit of it.
	But I always thought he was a stand-up comedian, right?
	No, he sort of went into that after he was, after The Office.
	So, like, if you're a stand-up watching him, you feel like, oh, this is someone doing a version of this thing we do.
	But really, it's more that I saw his routine about trans people and I thought it was very lazy.
	And, you know, I just, I would like him to have the same respect for trans people that he seems to have for animals.
	So, it's not stand-up comedy if I don't like it, essentially.
	Yeah, I think that's a really silly position to take as well, because Ricky Gervais has been doing stand-up for, like, 20 years.
	I don't want to say factual or not, I don't know the specifics, but he's definitely been doing stand-up for a long time.
	I think, I remember seeing an interview with him, actually, where he said that that's where his heart lies, is with stand-up.
	He doesn't actually like making shows, necessarily.
	It's just something that he does, but he enjoys doing the stand-up side of things, so I think he would be in total disagreement there.
	Yeah.
	But this is obviously the debate between Ricky Gervais' view on comedy and Frankie Boyle's view on comedy, in my view.
	Because the problem here is Frankie is saying, if these cartoons offend people, then we shouldn't do them.
	If this joke about transgenderism offends people, we shouldn't do them.
	And it's obviously this intersectionalist worldview, that we need to argue on intersectionalist lies, this is oppressing people, therefore we shouldn't do it.
	And Ricky Gervais is being a liberal and saying that the problem here is, no, no jokes off limits, don't care, gotta make the joke, it's just a joke.
	And Ricky did do a response to this on Twitter, which I wanted to mention, because good on Ricky, standing his ground, not taking it.
	I'll look down on everyone equally.
	Great.
	And keep it up, because people like Frankie just aren't funny anymore either.
	That's the problem with intersectional comedy.
	It isn't even good.
	I think there was some polling done in the United States as 2% of the public are actually progressive activists or have the same mindset as a progressive activist, so they're actually interested in intersectionality and all the rest of it.
	And sure, if those people want to watch a show, make a show, go put it out.
	They enjoy that 2% of the audience.
	But to get funded by the BBC, to then lecture people about, you know, you shouldn't make these jokes or that jokes, even though I made them 10 years ago, but I'm pulling up that ladder.
	No one's coming with me.
	Yeah, it's a bit rich, isn't it?
	Ridiculous.
	Anyway, we've been talking about time, so we need to hurry up.
	So the last thing here is just an update on the stimulus bill for the Americans, because this was something we covered earlier, and it was an absolute joke because of the pork inside.
	So the benefits for unemployment expired recently, and this was because the stimulus bill wasn't passed, so people weren't getting their checks.
	So, the problem here is, do you sign it, do you not?
	Because, of course, it's a terrible bill, and the reason it's a terrible bill, if we can show up the next one, was the amount of pork in it.
	And this is the hill, which is a left-leaning outlet, but did a great job here of listing the problems with it.
	Exhibit A. Of the funds appropriated under Title III of this Act that are made available for assistance for Pakistan, not less than 15 million shall be available for democracy programs, and not less than 10 million shall be made available for gender programs.
	And this is the Hills words.
	Yep.
	10 million for gender programs in Pakistan.
	It's like, right, okay, that's what American tax money needs to be spent on, does it?
	Like, maybe you agree that Pakistan needs some gender studies, or whatever, right?
	Okay, maybe it's an unequal society, it's an Islamic society, therefore we need to perform into being, I don't know, un-Islamic?
	Because that's the only solution you're going to get there to gender equality, in my view.
	So, okay, fine.
	Use your own money.
	You don't need to use taxpayers' money to do this.
	Definitely not 10 million dollars.
	No, it's a weird time to kind of shoehorn that into a bill as well.
	I think they're relying on the fact that no one's going to read that ridiculously long, what was it, 5,500 pages or something like that.
	Garbage.
	And some of the stuff in there is absurd.
	I've seen some of it myself, and it's so obvious that representatives are just throwing stuff in there, hoping that it sticks.
	Yeah, so we've got a lot more that's ridiculous here.
	But I just love the idea of the two gender professors in Pakistan.
	I just sat there like, oh, 5 million each.
	Anyway, Exhibit B. Funds for Resource Study of Springfield Race Riot.
	The riot that occurred in, check notes, 1908.
	A race riot in 1908.
	They're going to do a resource study on that riot.
	Okay, okay.
	Wait, how much was that again, sorry?
	but just funds, as the wording was.
	Exhibit C, statement of policy regarding the succession or reincarnation of the Dalai Lama.
	Yeah, we'll just leave that one there.
	That's what you spend money on.
	Exhibit D, there's actually a commission tasked with educating consumers about the dangers associated with using or storing portable fuel containers for flammable liquids near an open fire.
	So if you have flammable liquids, the government needs to be in charge of making sure that you know that it's flammable and shouldn't use it.
	I would imagine that most people are perfectly aware that that's a problem.
	That's a little bit insulting, isn't it?
	The government warning on it?
	Flammable?
	Is that not a giveaway?
	But okay, fine.
	That's worth money.
	Exhibit E. Another $40 million will be allocated for the necessary expenses for the operation, maintenance and security of the Kennedy Space Center, which received $25 million in additional aids this year.
	Kennedy Space Center has been closed for the entire year.
	So that'll be, what, $65 million for the year for something that isn't running?
	What's the justification for that?
	Is that paying for the...
	I'm assuming it's because, you know, I don't even know if the government shut it down, but the argument would be the government shut it down because of coronavirus, therefore it should be given money because we blocked it from operating.
	$65 million?
	That's a bit steep, isn't it?
	I don't know how much it needs to run, but that seems like a lot.
	For a mothballed centre?
	Okay.
	And then they list here, Exhibits F, G, H, I, and J. 86 million for assistance in Cambodia, 130 million for Nepal, 135 million for Burma, 453 million for Ukraine, and 700 million for Sudan.
	Exhibit K.
	The bill creates a women's history museum and an American Latino museum as part of the Smithsonian.
	So, gender-segregated museums, racial-segregated museums, and money for everyone who's foreign.
	That's awful.
	This is not the time.
	This is not the time to be giving millions and millions of dollars.
	Surely the American economy should have as much cash injected into it as possible.
	They shouldn't be donating it to loads of foreign countries.
	There should be a time where they're investing money inwards, not outwards.
	And this is the Hill saying this.
	So, you know, don't say, oh, this is the right-wing obsessed with foreign aid.
	Like, no.
	No, that's not the problem.
	Everyone's broke right now.
	The United States is probably going to be in a depression by next year.
	Yeah, no doubt.
	And the media response to this has been pathetic.
	Like, transparently pathetic.
	So if we can get Reuters up, this is Reuters' response to Trump turning around and saying, this bill is garbage.
	It's full of garbage.
	I'm not signing it.
	So their response was, Trump refuses to budge over aid bill, imperiling jobless benefits for millions.
	They don't even say why he opposes it.
	No, so the quote from here is, Trump stunned Republicans and Democrats alike last week when he was unhappy with the massive bill which provides $892 billion in badly needed relief.
	And then fails to mention the contents of the bill.
	Wow, that framing.
	Doesn't tell you all the pork, you know, the millions for foreign aid, the millions for gender studies programs and all the rest of it.
	No mention of that, because why would you?
	And it's the same from the BBC. We can get the BBC up.
	Their headline being, COVID, Trump fails to sign economic relief bill into law.
	So, you know, Trump man bad because he's failed to sign relief for COVID. That's such transparent framing.
	I don't understand how on earth they think they can get away with that, because even the people that voted for it were complaining about it.
	But there's obviously the additional problem here that the lockdowns are primarily within Democrat-run states and areas because, of course, they're also the cities, so they're most densely populated.
	So it's actually somewhat a bipartisan issue because, of course, the Republicans value personal freedom more, therefore less lockdowns, less need for government shutdowns that shut down the business, therefore you don't need relief.
	But all the Democrats need the relief because they've all shut down their states.
	So there's that bipartisan problem.
	The BBC isn't going to mention that.
	They're not going to talk about that because why would they?
	So the BBC says millions of Americans have temporarily lost their employment benefits after President Donald Trump failed to sign the COVID relief bill into law.
	No details whatsoever about that bill.
	Because why would you?
	That would mean that Orange Man isn't bad, and Orange Man is bad, so...
	Can't say anything like that.
	They also say the coronavirus economic relief is part of the $2.3 trillion spending package that includes $1.4 trillion for normal federal government spending.
	Normal federal government spending.
	Sending $10 million for gender programs in Pakistan is normal spending, folks.
	That's exactly normal.
	Nothing funny about that whatsoever.
	Thanks, BBC. So they then go on to take a quote from Biden, saying that Biden praised the example of members of Congress in compromising and reaching a bipartisan agreement, adding that President Trump should join them and make sure that millions of Americans can put food on the table and keep a roof over their heads in this holiday season.
	Biden cares.
	Biden's a man who cares.
	He's a politician who cares.
	I've never seen such a partisan article by the BBC, which is really saying something, actually.
	Yeah, I mean, the BBC's bad at the best of times, but no whole bars on this one.
	This is so transparent, I can't believe it.
	So they do mention here that on Twitter the president had reiterated his objection to the bill, saying, I simply want to put our great people $2,000 rather than the messy $600 that is now in the bill.
	That's it.
	They cut up all the criticism of the pork, all the billions of dollars being sent overseas.
	No, that's the only objection he has, folks.
	It's like, no, that's not the only objection, obviously.
	And this is bad because it allowed the Democrats to do this whole thing where it's like, oh, okay, fine, we'll up the money from $600 to $2,000 and not take anything else out.
	It's like, great, so you just made the bill, what, $500 billion more expensive and didn't get rid of any of the pork.
	Yeah, I think the media has given the Democrats an opportunity to keep all of this stuff that they've shoehorned in.
	I'm assuming it's Democrats, judging by the kind of things that they've added to it.
	I want to be fair, yeah, a lot of it is there, but my understanding is it's not entirely there.
	There were some accusations that Ted Cruz, for example, had been shoehorning in a few million in relief for oil firms, but I haven't been able to read the whole thing, so I didn't want to include it, but...
	Wasn't there also something about streaming services in there as well?
	Yeah, there was a whole bunch of nonsense, but this gets worse.
	CNN's probably the funniest, their headline, so we can get that one up.
	Trump's refusal to sign relief bill shows the chaos of the whole thing.
	Like, chaos!
	There's just chaos going on because he would sign this bill.
	It's like, well, why would he?
	It's trash.
	Who would want it?
	It's so strange that they're putting the responsibility on Trump when he wasn't the one that drafted this ridiculous bill.
	He's just the one that's got to sign it once it's been voting in Congress.
	Yeah, the Democrats put this together, put it in front of him and was like, why won't you sign it?
	How dare you not sign it?
	I mean, if you sent me a bill for executing half the population, I'm also not going to sign it.
	Why would you do that?
	So, Trump gave a statement about this.
	He said, So, this is his response.
	So, This I have criticism of, so if we can get the next one up as well, you can see that Trump signs the bill.
	So he did sign it, but he signed it with red lines of saying, get rid of this, get rid of that, get rid of this, get rid of that.
	So all of the nonsense, get rid of that stuff.
	Which, it then goes to the Senate, is my understanding from the research we've done, and it's up to the Republican, or it should be Republican-controlled Senate, to determine what to do with it.
	But it's obviously disappointing to see him sign it, even if he's redlining stuff and saying, this needs to go, but the rest of it's fine.
	Because the problem is you need to make the points of the Democrats.
	No, you're not selling $10 million to Pakistan for gender programs at this time.
	Like, Jesus Christ.
	But, as I mentioned, the problem with this is the framing.
	So, I think he did a bad job here, where he did allow himself to be quoted in a way like the BBC did, in which they made the point that his objection was that it's $600, not $2,000.
	And that was all of the left-wing headlines, and it's all the...
	I don't want to say mainstream.
	Yeah, mainstream, why not?
	BBC's mainstream.
	Yeah, I'd say so.
	Yeah.
	That's the problem with the bill, and that's Trump's only objection.
	So AOC and I think Rashida Tlaib were able to propose that that should be the change, and that was the only change they made.
	Kept in the gender programs, because why wouldn't you?
	Why should we get rid of them?
	So, if you can get the next link up to CNBC. So, yeah, passing it for $2,000 stimulus checks, leaving it to the GOP-controlled Senate.
	So this is bad framing for Republicans.
	This is not great PR, because it makes you look like they're doing all the right things.
	They're giving the $200, and it's not you who are the ones who are like, no, we're not going to pass all this pork.
	You better give that money to the American people instead of foreigners for gender programs.
	Well, I think...
	I'm hopping on that one a lot, but it's the point of, like, what was in there as well?
	There was, like, the millions of dollars being sent to Israel for the Iron Dome.
	God, and even in the best of times, this is debatable.
	But in now, which is the worst of times, it's not debatable.
	Yeah, it's ridiculous, and I think what the media has failed to report on is just how much...
	Along the political divide, people are opposing this bill, even though many of them still voted for it.
	Many Democrats were frustrated with all the stuff that had been shoehorned in, and none of that is mentioned.
	It's being framed as if the Republicans are opposing giving the American people aid money, as opposed to the fact that the bill is chock full of loads of irrelevant nonsense to that issue.
	Yeah, which is a shame.
	I don't know how he would have solved it.
	You know, I'm not a political genius like the Goll Emperor, but there is obviously a problem here that the PR war has been lost to some extent.
	But this is why you need to watch alternative media.
	You cannot just watch mainstream media and read mainstream news outlets.
	Absolutely, yeah.
	Because they just will not give you the facts.
	They will give you their version of events, which leaves everything else out.
	And sure, maybe you're a big fan of Pakistani gender programs.
	Maybe you're a Pakistani gender professor and you're...
	You're really outraged that I'm saying these things, but I'm glad you're watching, I guess.
	Let's end it there.
	Sorry to be a bit of a rush, and I'm sorry to be shouting at least a bit, but we're running out of time, so I have to carry on.
	So if we have some Super Chats, we'll do them, and then we've got to head off, because timing's not great.
	Sorry, Carl couldn't be here right now.
	He's home still, so we'll have him back at some point.
	But this is the first question from SpuddyBuddy.
	Frankie Boyle, from alpha insulter to soy boy in chief, talk about mental moral degradation under the influence of the woke regime.
	Absolutely pathetic.
	Absolutely right, Spuddy.
	Couldn't have put it better.
	Great way of putting it.
	Yeah, I'm just going to load these up.
	Do you want to read some of these?
	Yeah, sure.
	I've got a dry throat.
	I've been drinking too much over Christmas, I think.
	That's what you get.
	Okay, where are we?
	Screen's kind of messing up, we Oh, yeah.
	I don't know what's going on there.
	But this...
	Okay, it says, no Carl, no peace.
	Yeah, sorry, Carl's not here today, but we'll go back to you when we can.
	Yeah, we have a problem with the thing.
	Oh, no, it hasn't.
	Sorry, lads.
	A bit awkward.
	We're trying to load the superchats and the names are sliced in half, and we don't want to just not say our names.
	It seems to be working now.
	There we go, that's better.
	That's too far, John.
	Way too far.
	There we go.
	So, the engaged few.
	If this gig doesn't work out for Josh, he could find a great career doing audiobooks.
	Thank you.
	Andrew Knapp.
	I was in Tennessee for Christmas.
	The blast brought most of the internet access down across a large area.
	Some Walmarts couldn't even process card payments.
	I did read about that, actually.
	Thanks for bringing that up.
	I forgot to mention it.
	Easy E. I've had AT&T as a cell carrier and ISP. He's probably not a conspiracy theorist.
	He probably just got off the phone with their customer service.
	I did see it with, I think, Tim Paul's with AT&T as well.
	It's been like a month and they still haven't installed his Wi-Fi.
	Jesus, man.
	I don't know what it is with American internet companies and cell companies, but it's trash.
	The ones in the UK aren't much better, I can assure you of that from my experiences.
	So...
	Daniel J. Corica.
	It's got some hyphens in between.
	My theory is that it was a test to see what a bomb would do to credit card infrastructure because it was an AT&T credit card service that went down.
	Maybe, but I don't know if you'd kill yourself.
	Yeah, if it were a test, why would he kill himself?
	Oh, you missed one.
	Sorry.
	Oh, sorry, I accidentally skipped your second one.
	The Engage for you yet again.
	The AT&T building was an old Marbell switching station, so it was Cold War era construction.
	The place was hardened as it would have been considered a continuity of government infrastructure.
	Okay.
	Probably why it didn't take so much damage then.
	I imagine so, yeah.
	So, President-elect Jui Biden.
	The Nashville boomer died to distract from the election fraud.
	Disavow.
	I don't know what YouTube's terms of service are this week.
	I've been off.
	J-A-F-O on the bound.
	Oh, I missed one out.
	Sorry.
	Daniel J. Corica again.
	I also believe that he was a patsy.
	I'm not sure I know what that means.
	JAFO on the bound.
	In the second video, the RV is on the left-hand side, but if you slow down the video, explosion is on the right-hand side of the road.
	I've seen a lot of VBI videos to know this doesn't look right.
	Yeah, I did see on Twitter some footage slowed down, but I don't know how reliable it is.
	Where you can see the van and then the explosion seemingly coming from another side.
	But it's a Twitter video?
	Yeah.
	Security footage?
	I don't know.
	I haven't really seen any breakdowns of the video, necessarily.
	I've seen things here and there, but I haven't investigated it to the extent that, you know, I'm looking at where the blast was coming from and mapping it out.
	You don't want to come out and be like, we've got proof.
	I want you to prove my Twitter video I found.
	It's possible.
	Xeranx if you look at the video shared by Andy Ngo you can see the flash fire retreat to the point of origin it's away from the TV, also no cars in front I assume that's the one he's talking about Yeah, I imagine so.
	So check out Andy Ngo's Twitter if you want to see that.
	Not so stealthy yeti.
	The song Downtown was also featured in the movie Flight of the Intruder when the protagonist decides to disobey orders and strike the North Vietnamese.
	I haven't seen that film.
	You're saying this is a hate crime?
	He's targeting a Vietnamese guy living in the building.
	Guitar operator.
	Frankie is a grifter.
	His jokes were even more raw than fresh beef.
	They were great.
	Now he's some left-wing, wokiest noob calling out other comedians that are tame by comparison.
	You're not wrong there.
	It sucks to watch, man.
	Like, Frankie, I'm probably getting the timeline a little bit off, but his Mog the Week stuff, I think, is early 2000s, or at least late 2000s, and intersectionality hadn't taken off at that point.
	So he was able to get away with this, and then he's just brought into the cult, and it's killed his own comedy, and it's killing his own personality.
	Yeah, like, he's...
	I follow comedy quite a lot, and you hardly ever see him anymore.
	He's kind of dropped off the radar.
	I thought it was just because he'd been deplatformed, but clearly it's not.
	No, he's got his own show!
	It sucks.
	So, Thunderstorm.
	Afraid of 5G? A tech guy, really?
	Check out Michael F. Shua.
	He ran the Ben Laden desk and talks about stage events.
	FBI, CIA. I don't know much about that.
	No, me neither.
	Mutstream.
	We'll write down the name.
	What's this insanity?
	I get here late and all I see is Josh and Callum.
	Where is my Hugo?
	Everyone press H in the chat.
	Team Hugo forever.
	I hope that's your concern.
	That's the problem here.
	That's all the weekend part.
	Yeah, we've got a weekend podcast coming up.
	Hugo Simps, you've got your own place.
	Separate but equal.
	The engaged few.
	Oh my lord, the Marxist tripe.
	I think I might just cringe my skeleton into fine powder.
	Yeah, yeah, it's not good.
	If you want to check that out as well, it's called New World Order.
	If you like cringe and you feel like that's going to be your afternoon.
	The Earl of Longford, this is what you get for turning away from the Pope.
	I can make all kinds of jokes with my melanin-rich mates exporting a lot of our lefties to London.
	Well, aren't you guys about to get a Sinn Féin government?
	So I don't know about that.
	I don't know, what is Sinn Féin's joke policy?
	I can't say I know.
	I remember Carl, when he was doing the tour, he got called in, I think it was the BBC, and the BBC called in a joke expert from a university.
	A joke expert?
	Yeah, to explain whether or not his joke was a joke, and it was just like, Jesus Christ.
	Like, this is where...
	This is where the extremists end up, because they can't have laughter.
	So everything has to be finely analysed to be like, is this okay, is this not okay?
	Rather than just socially doing it.
	Surely you can just say, well, I was joking, and people can take you at your word, because why would you say anything to the contrary?
	No, because then I could say all sorts of stuff and be like, joke.
	That's true.
	You can tell if someone's joking.
	You don't need a joke expert.
	BBC does, apparently.
	Nicholas Fitzgerald, pretty sad that the only meaningful news coverage on the Nashville bombing from an American's perspective is coming from two Brits.
	Thank you for both taking the time to lay everything out.
	Happy New Year.
	Thank you very much.
	DRT is king, so Sargon is on a beach enjoying himself.
	In the UK in the middle of winter?
	I don't think so.
	I did that over Christmas and it was horrible.
	It was freezing cold.
	God.
	Stuart McLean.
	Frankie is a ginger, and gingers will be extinct in another generation.
	Probably by 2066, I heard, but...
	Well hung in dung.
	Netflix.
	To be silent is to be complicit.
	Dear Netflix, I'm a white guy who think...
	Sorry, I'm a white guy who is...
	Pirating your shows.
	Cheers.
	Yeah, I don't endorse pirating Netflix shows, YouTube.
	Just making that clear.
	But also, Netflix is garbage.
	Don't use it.
	The Earl of Longford.
	Did Netflix yeet all of their Jack Sparrow movies?
	I don't know.
	Maybe.
	Have they?
	They did.
	They did.
	Was that because of the Amber Heard court case?
	Yeah, just an accusation that he hit his wife.
	And then, all of your art is no longer art.
	Didn't she go to the toilet in his bed as well and almost cut his finger off?
	Took a number two in his bed.
	Yeah.
	Yeah, okay, her movies stay up.
	Eric Edward.
	Where be the Carl?
	Also Simpo Clock time for the Hugo.
	Oh, for God's sake.
	That's all hours of the day, it seems.
	Someone get the gun.
	The Earl of Longford, Irish constitution guarantees speech.
	If you ever need to flee, you know we are close by.
	How to address this when most people are practicalists, not principled.
	That's interesting.
	I'm going to look that up because, funny fact, the Soviet constitution and also the North Korean constitution both guarantee the right to free speech.
	It's true, but it's in the French way.
	So the French right of man is that you have the right to free speech, but the limits are defined by law.
	Which of course means you don't have the right.
	So it's only like an olive branch.
	Yeah, so it's the same with the Soviets and the North Koreans.
	You have the right as long as you don't cause disruption or whatever the wording was.
	So I've got to check out the Irish one, but I hope it's not the French.
	I should hope it's better than that.
	Yeah, do the British style.
	Just end it.
	You have the right to free speech.
	Done.
	Dirty Belter, question for you both.
	What was your first exposure to PC culture that made you really think?
	For me, it was Gamergate.
	I just wanted to play video games.
	Love the show.
	Have a nice day.
	That's really nice.
	You go first.
	I was attending a political discussion at a university, and this was just at the start of when Woke was kicking off, like 2014, 2013 maybe, and they were just being really rude to the people who came out of their own time, and this was essentially just like a student-y thing, and they'd pointed out that, hey, we're here in our own time, we're just having a friendly discussion, there's no election, no pressure.
	And then everyone was, like, screaming murder at them and being horrible.
	And I was just like, wow, this is not very nice.
	So it was just a lack of...
	It was like a...
	I think there was a Conservative, a Lib Dem, Labour, and a local journalist were on the panel.
	And they were just being grilled for coming out and doing this in their spare time.
	And I just felt like it was really unreasonable.
	And that was what kind of made me look at what these people were saying and the kind of accusations they were levelling against them.
	So it kind of went under my radar, kind of following more mainstream politics at the time.
	For me, I think it was probably one of Carl's videos.
	If not that, it would have been the BBC refusing to hire white people for internships because of reasons.
	And me thinking, hang on a second.
	Imagine if you did this in reverse.
	Yeah, that meets the definition of racism as far as I'm concerned.
	Racial discrimination is against the law.
	Absolutely.
	Apparently not for the BBC. Thunderstorm.
	It must keep them up at night knowing they gave us American citizens $600.
	It must really bother them.
	I'm assuming the Pakistani professors there.
	I bet they're not.
	I bet they're having a great time.
	Five million each.
	All one of them.
	Ten million then.
	Rational Redneck.
	On the subject of COVID-19, I would like to point out that everyone...
	Sorry, I would like to point to everyone the CDC study that outlines the health risks of going to prison after having Bill Clinton on your frequent flyer program.
	Happy New Year.
	I bet there are significant health risks.
	I hope there are significant health risks.
	Easy E. Trump signing the bill is pretty clever.
	I wonder why.
	According to the Impoundment Act, if they don't make the change Trump outlined the money is frozen.
	I don't know about that, but that's pretty cool.
	Okay, that is interesting.
	Did you hear the guy that shared the prison cell have ever seen COVID?
	Oh, yeah.
	Uh...
	The last person to share a cell with...
	Okay, I don't know if anyone heard John, but he said the guy who shared the cell with Jeffrey Epstein last has apparently died of COVID. Yeah, the only person who's actually seen him in prison.
	I'm not laughing at the death, I'm just laughing at the pure coincidence.
	Shaker...
	Oh no, is...
	Shaker Silver.
	Look up Impoundment Control Maneuver Act.
	This is what the guy previously mentioned.
	Trump wants the Dem House to stand by their pork invisibly, as they did.
	Also, Bernie trying to filibuster.
	I bet he is.
	So yeah, maybe it is, as I said, I'm not a political expert, like the God Emperor, so maybe he has pulled off some good 4D chess here, which is going to be good to watch.
	You want to do something?
	Sure.
	Ryan Ibarra.
	Gotta love how bipartisan legislation means taking American relief hostage in order to pay off politicians' political debts.
	But hey, they care.
	Lord Svalzino.
	Callum, you're doing a great job and hope to hear more from you and Josh in the future.
	Already subbed Gold Tier.
	Cheers, lads.
	Thank you.
	That's very nice.
	Thank you very much.
	Really keeping us going.
	That's the people who subbed.
	Alright, no.
	No, it was 500 million, not 800 trillion.
	Still, pretty weird.
	But then again, I think they gave 250 million to Palestine, so...
	I don't know, I don't want to get into the whole Palestine-Israel thing.
	No, probably best not to.
	It wasn't just money for Israel, it was money for everyone.
	So...
	Eric Dieter, here's a fix to a relief bill.
	How about Trump sign an ex-order?
	I'm assuming he means executive, yeah.
	Suspending earned income tax for the first quarter of 2021.
	That's not really a bad idea.
	Reward workers and incentivise bus owners...
	Business owners.
	Oh.
	I was going to say, that was a bit specific.
	Yeah, versus giving loads of tax money to leeches.
	Not sure if that's the right thing to call them, but the Pakistani professors certainly are.
	Three months of...
	You've written this weird, sorry.
	Three months of tax is around 2k.
	Less than 2k for most.
	I see what he's saying.
	So if you want to actually affect working people, it's better to give people a tax break rather than sign this relief bill.
	I think that's the point he's trying to make.
	Maybe.
	I'm not an economics expert, but we will be after we do the academic course.
	Oh yeah, we'll be doing that soon.
	Mute Stream.
	Oh god.
	Every time I see your name, I'm always like, oh.
	For the Glasses Fund.
	Glasses?
	Oh, for me, yeah.
	Okay, screw you.
	Happy to help you boys out.
	Thank you.
	The well-known hate symbol of that.
	Nude Stream, god damn, there's tons of hashtag Team Hugo in the chat.
	Love it.
	I bet you are.
	Political pothead, people in Taiwan are more supportive of Trump than the feckless GOP.
	They're rallying for him because they see what's coming.
	An impending CCP invasion.
	They also don't have the American media trying to propagandize them as well.
	They can see it from a clear outsider's perspective.
	Hmm.
	I don't know if I think there's an invasion coming.
	I don't think the CCP will be able to pull that off.
	But it is interesting to see them actually rally more for Trump.
	I don't know if you saw the rally for Taiwanese people.
	I haven't actually.
	I haven't even heard about it.
	Look up Taiwanese Trump rally for people who wonder what's going on.
	It's great.
	Lordsfell Zeno for 20 US Australian dollars.
	Thank you very much.
	I love that we have literally everyone on the planet.
	We have the Australians, the Americans.
	I love living in the middle of the world time zone wise.
	It's great.
	Thanks, man.
	We've got Cakeskill.
	Quick COVID comment.
	The new strains may be a result of prolonged global lockdowns with the virus mutating in multiple isolated communities.
	I think lots of medical professionals have said similar things actually in that with the lockdowns we're kind of prolonging our exposure to it therefore it's giving it more opportunities to mutate.
	But I'm no virologist I'm just a psychologist.
	Disavow our own statements, just in case YouTube...
	Yep, disavow.
	Alfonso Curi.
	I'm a bit late this morning, but chances are a techie wouldn't fall for the 5G conspiracy theory.
	I was wondering about that.
	Like, if he's a techie, surely he has...
	Yeah, I did consider it, but then I don't really know much about it, so I kind of just took the FBI investigating it at face value.
	I didn't really want to emphasise it too much, but...
	Oh, John's just refreshed it.
	Bad timing.
	But he mentions that that's the FBI's only theory.
	Sounds like they are trying to discredit him as a psycho for PR reasons.
	Typical FBI tactic.
	It wouldn't surprise me.
	I feel like saying that he was depressed or just saw no reason in living is an inadequate explanation in this day and age.
	There's got to be some kind of political motivation or...
	Yeah, there's always got to be a bigger picture and sometimes there just isn't.
	Maybe there is, but we don't have any other...
	Yeah, it's impossible to say, yeah.
	Rational Redneck.
	Callum, discount Carl confirmed.
	I wouldn't say discount.
	Who's, what's his name?
	The guy, the corn guy.
	Jake.
	Sorry, you might not know Jake.
	I don't know.
	Carl did a debate with him a while back.
	I was watching, he was reacting to some of our videos.
	And the chat has dubbed me Carl's Jr.
	I think that's the best group I've had.
	Eric Dieter, hashtag defund the Fed.
	Why not?
	MuteStream, my new goal in life is to make Callum a Hugo simp.
	I will die before that happens.
	Snafu, $5, a hashtag defund all governments.
	I'm not an anarchist, but defund the foreign funding for foreign government Pakistani...
	Sorry, did I mention the word?
	Gender programs, anyway.
	Andreas E., who should be surprised that locking down would result in more mutations?
	Fair point.
	I don't know much about it, but yeah, that's the end of the show, folks.
	We've run out of time.
	Thank you very much for watching.
	Someone sent another super chat, so I'll do it.
	Foreign aid equals money laundering.
	It sure does.
	I bet that money is not going to gender-study professors.
	Those hard-working gender-study professors are not getting what they deserve.
	It's probably going to some tyrant in Pakistan.
	Shall we do one last plug of John's making of video?
	Yeah.
	Check out the making of video, Making of the Lotus Eaters, made by John Wong Productions.
	Yeah, we've been recording since we moved into the building.
	It's actually not that exciting.
	Yeah, it's not that exciting.
	But do sign up.
	Yeah, sign up.
	Although we will be putting out the Antifa video on the...
	If you can get the video channel up, just so anybody who doesn't know...
	I mean, just search up, like, Google it.
	We have a video channel as well.
	If you want to go to the podcast The Lotus Eaters, you should see it there.
	It's called The Lotus Eaters.
	We'll be putting out a video later about the history of British Antifa and how the British Transport Police knocked them the F out.
	This is great.
	Yeah, they literally raided their houses up and down the country, and I made a short video just telling people about it.
	Wasn't it all coordinated across the country as well?
	It's fantastic.
	British Transport Police were like the proud boys of the Utah in the early 2000s.
	But anyway, let's end it because we've got to do stuff.

▲