BudPod with Phil Wang & Pierre Novellie - Episode 114 - Acceleration of Sin

Episode Date: May 12, 2021

Live comedy is back, baby! Get tickets to see Pierre in Soho 24-29th of May here: https://sohotheatre.com/shows/pierre-novellie-expected-to-care-2/The boys discuss Britney Spears, lawyer brain, local elections, the acceleration of sin, mental health, how being a nonce is the only thing people mind now, social anxiety and the return of live comedy. Get bonus BudPod on Patreon! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's Budpod 112. Uh, 112. Fucking hell. 114. Um, actually, appropriately, Phil, I was going to say 114. I would say 14, strong contender for the most awkward age. 14. Yeah, I think that's...

I think... Now you say that, I think 14 was the worst year of my life. Oh, wait. No, I tell a lie. 13 was, actually. Oh, okay. Yeah, 13 was. I think maybe 13. 13 was actually. Oh, okay. Yeah, 13 was. I think maybe 13 is worse than 14.

Do you think? Yeah. Yeah, I think so because you're not a girl, not yet a woman, Pierre. Yes, that's true. Yes, that is true. Brittany, our girl, our Brittany. You're not a girl, not yet a woman at 13.

Is that what she said when she was 13? No, her song. I'm not a girl, not yet a woman. Are you not familiar with the Spears canon? Not on the same level as you, clearly. Which song was this? How old was she when she sang the song? She would have been 20, early 20s 20s okay that's less creepy fine

because she was a a disney kid or whatever mickey mouse club disney kid she was missing mickey mouse club yeah um i watched the bbc documentary about her and the controversy around like who basically who owns her estate currently yes Free Britney is the whole thing isn't it yeah yeah and you know what

she made some absolute bangers listening to those songs I was like shit I think she's basically David Bowie, actually. Do you think so? I mean, I don't think she wrote the songs, but, I mean, it's hit upon hit, Pierre. I think she should be up there with David Bowie

for the most musically influential figures of our lifetime. Do you think? Well, influential, that's actually fair enough. Yeah, yeah. But also just, like, rate of bang lifetime. Do you think? Well, influential, that's actually fair enough. Yeah, yeah. But also just like rate of bangers. I mean, they don't push the boat out musically, I suppose, as David Bowie did, but they're still cracking songs there.

But yeah, I mean, she wanted to be like a star when she was a kid, and her mom was one of these parents who like take her to pageants and say my girl's gonna be a star and it worked too well maybe yeah well yeah all those pageants and stuff are um deeply deeply concerning i'd say very american i'd be so disappointed if those pageants weren't literally just all fbi sting deeply concerning, I'd say. Very American. I'd be so disappointed if those pageants weren't literally just all FBI sting operations.

All to catch a predator. Single. We catch like 12 predators per event. It's the most efficient. Do you think there'd be FBI agents like, in my day, one man would sit and he'd work hard and he'd catch a single predator. But now, these modern methods,

they're just, it's like trawling the sea for fish with nets. There's no skill to it. Yeah, I wonder how many they can get in one sting operation. How many predators they can get in one sting operation how many predators they can catch in one sting operation i'm just like at one little kid's beauty pageant yeah well then chris chris hansen or whoever the host of to catch a predator was would have to like walk out onto the stage like the host it's too big you can't just do it individually he'd have to come people like are you ready for miss miss little miss louisiana 2021 and i was like yeah please welcome your host chris hansen and chris hansen comes and goes hi so what are you doing here and everyone in the audience just scrambles and runs out of their seats it looks like footage of um when everyone's jumping out of the way of

that moving train in the first ever movie everyone's leaping over seats and then they're like the doors are locked like the the big escape doors you get in a gym. Double doors. Yeah. They've locked the doors from the outside! No! Chris Hansen's just slowly walking towards him like the Terminator. What are you doing here? You like talent shows?

Yeah, that would be good If you're a nonce then Chris Hansen is the Terminator I suppose I guess so I guess he's your worst nightmare I wonder if they do fear him I didn't know his name was Chris Hansen What a life he has I'm the guy

What does he say at dinner parties I'm the p... Yeah, what does he say at dinner parties? I'm the peter-catching guy. Yeah. Yeah, I turn it into entertainment. Yeah, I make it fun. Oh, gosh. Do you think... Do you think when he's in a bar, people buy him drinks?

Yeah, although they'd be very careful to make it clear they've not put anything in it but do you think they'd be like thank you for your service or something you know um i guess so i guess those like crazy sort of save the children people that's what they're called right the pizzagate people yeah they must he must be kind of a hero for them like set them down the path yeah they think yeah what is it they think every they think the world is run by evil pedos or lizards or something and they have all these kids so they evil pedo cannibals that's right and they want their blood they need the young blood yeah something along those lines yeah i will say their internal theology isn't really clear. Like the logic of their universe. Yeah, exactly.

If it was a comic book, I'd be like, yeah. Is this sci-fi or is this fantasy? Yeah. Yeah, you can't Star Wars your way out of this one, Pizzagate. You can't trick me. Who's the villain here? How does this power work exactly? Where's the science?

If you're going to mention science, you have to justify it. Yeah. Amazing. If you'd said that huge sections of America would self-radicalize, and then that radicalization would spread to other sort of western countries or around the world a little bit I like that in itself is not so crazy and if you'd said oh it was to do with being very right-wing or very I go yeah yeah yeah that all that all tracks I can imagine that happening sure but if you'd said it was to do with

pedo cannibal like they need their blood because it makes them more powerful and i just i really would not have bet on them i mean there's something sort of beautiful about it in that because of the internet we found out that there are equally fucking insane people in every country of all creeds and cultures of all races and beliefs. They are just all fucking, they're just all, there are millions of nutters who,

who share in common with the fellow nutters, the fact that they're real nutters and nutters of different languages, uh, different histories. They're just fucking nutters. And the internet has shown us that, you know, there's more that connects us

than divides us, Pierre. That is true. That is true. For some people, that is being fucking nuts. That's true. Tinfoil hats around the world. Yeah.

Tinfoil hats on the house for everyone. Just loads of people in tinfoil hats on the house for everyone just loads of people in tinfoil hats holding hands like underneath a rainbow kind of swaying from side to side yeah yeah how have you been?

have you one more week Pierre until a bit more freedom, baby. One more week until... Cinema day. One more week until society's left bum cheek is raised slightly higher to relieve just a little more of the pressure

of the fart of freedom. of the fart of freedom have you been finding yourself socially actually anxious, Pierre? are you finding yourself able to maintain light conversation? have you forgotten the skill? I'm a little rusty

I haven't found myself socially anxious so much as anxious when like well remembering what it's like to be in a crowd is weird more than a few people I was just thinking about it yeah of course

more than a few people in a tube carriage and you sort of think oof I feel like my object permanence with regards to people has been reset. You know, like how children below a certain age, once you take something out of sight, it doesn't exist anymore.

Peekaboo. I feel that way with... Peekaboo, exactly. I feel that way with people now. I feel like I might have people peekaboo. And, you know what I mean? So I can't... I think having more than have people peekaboo. And you know what I mean? So I can't, I think having more than six people in a room, I'd be like, I wouldn't be able to keep track.

Yeah. You know, and like, if I turn my head, I forget one of them was in the room. And people are going to have to be presented to me in a big grid. And their square lights up when they start talking. Yeah, and when they start talking yeah and when they start to see everyone's face in one in one sort of flies vision snapshot and when they start talking their face their face they they walk really close to you and they fill your vision with their one face yeah if you have

that setting if you have that theater setting or whatever on, when you go to a party and start talking to someone, if someone else starts talking, they shove the person you're talking to out of the way and stick their face in front of your face. Even if they're just doing something like coughing or sneezing. Or farting. Yeah, if you're having a conversation with someone and someone else needs to fart,

they will come up and shove the person out of the way and just go then walk off with their face fully in your face like they're trying to intimidate you to leave imagine doing that imagine grabbing the sides of someone's head and putting your face right in front of theirs like the godfather and just farting

yeah like some sort of bonobos threat like something a chimp would do to scare off a rival male that's um one one of the best early punk bands was bonobos threat phil they were they invented the whole smashing your instruments thing but then they also threw their feces because of the name and people hated it yeah that was a step too far for bonobos threat that was their undoing really it was their unpooing it was bonobos threats on pooing um yeah yeah i find myself a little anxious i tell well well i'll tell you what's making me what's making me anxious for for reals uh phil is that i listeners this is for you pod buds i'm doing some live comedy in three weeks. Wow, wow, wow, wow. Wee, wee, wee, woo, woo.

Live comedy in this day and age. I know. I know. I have agreed, listeners, to do a week, a week, Monday to Saturday at the Soho Theatre in London in the downstairs cabaret room

because cabaret is the least diseasable room. And it's Monday, the 24th of May, to Saturday, the 29th of May, 7pm. Anyone who bought tickets for my old Soho show that was cancelled two months before it could happen because of the COVID, you can transfer your tickets over.

I assume you've had an email about this. Anyway, I figured it was worth saying. But yeah, I'm doing this show from the 2019 Fringe. I'm going to have to update it. I'm going to have to fiddle with it. Amazing. So that's 24th till 29th you're doing that? Inclusive. 24th to the 29th.

Sweet. Okay. The whole week, Bebe. I'm definitely going to come. I'm going to come. I'm really hoping. And then I'll go to see Pierre's show yeah that's right I hope that the material hasn't aged too badly

Phil I open with delicious bat soup that's the name of that routine yeah yeah how delicious nutritious and safe bat soup is and then there's that bit of the show where I get people well at the end of the show it's a bit like church except you have to turn and cough into that bit of the show where I get people... Well, at the end of the show, it's a bit like church,

except you have to turn and cough into the mouth of the person next to you and say, peace be with you. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I always found that the most moving part of the show. Well, I mean, not to spoil anything, but it's a callback to the routine about how much I love coughing that I do in the first 10 minutes. And everyone goes, oh, we remember.

And it's very satisfying, but I don't know. Yeah, and you get everyone to join in on the big three two one in your cough together yeah i think they'll age fine i think they'll be fine i think so i think i think so i'm gonna open with uh i'm gonna open with some classic gags but i just flew in from wuhan and boy are my antibodies tired. Things like that. Classic stand-up gags. But that's pretty soon. You have the soonest comeback stand-up run

I know of. Yeah, well when Soho got in touch and they were like do you want to do your run again? And I was like of course I do. And they went it's in three weeks and I went yeah! Yes! Yes! run again and i was like of course i do and they went it's in three weeks and i went yes yes yes and um i'm genuinely the thing that's worrying me is i genuinely have not put on my stage clothes for a year and a half and i have gotten a much girthier in that time. You're basically Batman in The Dark Knight Rises.

You've got to use that hydraulic thing to crack your knees back open. You're going to have to give her the bat belt, the utility belt, a couple of extra notches, go down to Timpson's, get him to punch him in. Unlike when Thor is fat. Yeah, yeah, and you've got the same Norse knowledge, I suppose.

That's true, yeah. Fat Thor. You're Fat Thor. I'm Fat Thor and I'll be available for viewing in Soho at the end of the month, which is very exciting, but hopefully people will come. Is there a particular bit that you genuinely are like, that's not going

to work now? Yeah, well in that show, I did some stuff about the upcoming verdict in the Shamima Begum trial. Some stuff about ISIS, and I might have to just do a routine going like, who remembers ISIS? There's have to just do a routine going like who remembers ISIS

there's going to be so much of that in stand up this year there's going to be so much do you remember so much anyone remember blank it's going to be like a Peter Kay convention do you remember do you remember ISIS

do you remember they'd swear allegiance in a lone wolf format so there was no way to tell who was doing it do you remember? Do you remember ISIS? Do you remember? They'd swear allegiance in a lone wolf format so there was no way to tell who was doing it. Do you remember? I mean, you could sort of semi-update it with that story from near the beginning of the pandemic where ISIS were telling its members not to go to Europe because it was too dangerous.

Yes, exactly, yeah. We did it. We got them. All it took was to suicide bum ourselves with plague yeah are you feeling anxious about you're feeling anxious pierre um i definitely need to like i haven't performed um many gigs like normally Phil, you and I would be doing a few gigs a week, say. Yeah. On average. I'll let you say that.

Yeah. And we've probably done two weeks worth of gigs in like a year and a half. That's a pretty good observation. Yeah, I reckon it's about that. So that's very crazy and very like... Yeah, and listeners, most comedians will agree, I think,

that you start to feel a bit rusty if you go on holiday and don't do any stand-up for like a week or two. So this is going to be very, very interesting. I will say the small number of gigs I've done, and I did a gig a few weeks weeks ago say like zoom gigs or they've gone very well so that's something yeah yeah it's going to be interesting and i just uh also you just want people to come because it's socially distant so if i don't sell it out i look like a real covid covid knobhead i'm sure you will

it'll be full of pod buds it'll be full of pod buds celebrating they'll just be jacking it in the aisles and also I think like people will be slipping and sliding all over the place I think the effects of disruption do plateau you know what I mean I think the effect of not doing stand up for a month is probably about the same as not doing it for a year

yeah that's true you don't forget how to ride a bike yeah that's right. You don't forget how to ride a bike. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, that is very true. But I do hope your anxiety isn't giving you too much mental health, Pierre. We were talking about this earlier.

People keep saying mental health as if it's the thing that's wrong. Yeah, it's like, I've got mental health. Mental health is really dangerous to everyone. You have to be sure not to catch mental health it's one of my real pet peeves yeah it's my real pet peeve and you can't get angry at people because usually they've got mental health

so you can't you don't compound their mental health by saying you're being wrong technically you have mental illness not mental health because in in a moment that's that's rarely the most important uh thing yeah or they're being very nice it does grind my gears or they're being very nice about other people with mental health yeah yeah but if someone says

i have really um um it's it's hard isn't it because you could say i have really bad mental health yeah that makes sense but then they go they they think that that you could say i have really bad mental health yeah that makes sense but then they go they they think that that's like saying i have really bad uh you know gas right yeah that they can just then say mental health and it's like no no you're you're i've been mental health or um i'm i my my mental health is is is is suffering or declining or it's a state of positive existence. And yeah, if someone is saying oh, when people correct my grammar it makes me want to kill myself.

I'm suffering from mental health. You just have to squeeze your lips together like just keep bringing your mouth up. Yeah, you can't take them aside and go, I heard what you said, but, um... Yeah. And I hope you get better.

I just want to point out that you're actually getting it wrong when you say you've got mental health. I would like to be very clear that what I am doing in this moment is prioritising grammatical correctness and abstract concept over you and your brain and how you feel. I care more about the words.

Even though everyone understood what you said, I still am more interested in that than your genuine human problem. Even though everyone understood what you said. It took everyone just a fraction of a second longer Than it needed to And I won't stand for it

But yeah well I hope your upcoming Soho run isn't giving you too much mental health I think If I'm lucky and it all goes well And lots of people come which I hope they do I will get I'm lucky and it all goes well and lots of people come, which I hope they do, I will get some really good mental health from it. And I won't just get mental health. I'll get good mental health.

Yeah. Yeah. Mental healthy. I'll get mental healthy. I'll get mental healthy. Well, I'm going to have to get mentally healthy to fit my fat arse into my trousers has it really got that bad oh boy yeah i uh well i mean because so i've got stand-up about this but when i get fat it's like the whole body like

evenly like when you enlarge a picture in photoshop yeah yeah yeah or like when you i don't know if you ever played like smackdown or raw yeah um the rest of the wwe video games but if you create your own character and you just like slide the weight scale to the right it all just expands at the same rate exactly that's exactly the arms the head yeah so that's exactly my body is a is a character designer body um body but what that means is you know how sometimes you see those guys in their 50s and they have a big old beer belly but they're still wearing the skinny jeans they wore when they were in their 20s

so I can't do that it's the whole thing all the clothes have to change or none of them do whereas if you get fat in one place you can kind of go okay I need a new shirt but the trousers are fine or whatever. Yeah. That's my issue.

But you have to get a full new wardrobe. Yeah. So I'm trying to. I'm worried about that. And I'm too. I don't even want to try the trousers on now in case it gives me mental health. Because it really would give me mental health to be fair if i try them on now and it's like essentially it's like trying to put a sock on my whole leg then i will be upset with myself um yeah so i'm worried

about that and so as a result my my stage clothes my my suit trousers and my jacket and my shirt and they're in a suit carrier bag that I last used in the West End with Frank Skinner and they're just in my cupboard like the telltale heart just waiting for me, the challenger yeah yeah

come here remember us squeeze us give you a hug squeeze us onto your ham-like body Come here. Remember us. Squeeze us. Give you a hug. Squeeze us onto your ham-like body. Yes. Yes. It's like we are cotton condoms.

Like a diver's wetsuit. A very formal wetsuit. It's exciting, though. That's exciting though It's an exciting mixture Of can he, will he, will we Can he, will we, will we Can he, will we, will we Yeah It's interesting to watch

The gradual easing Of lockdown And sort of as I expected It's interesting to watch the gradual easing of lockdown. And sort of as I expected, it's not the single great hurrah. You know, it's all just sort of slow and bit by bit. Yeah, people would have wanted like a VE day, you know? Yeah, but it's not going to happen. Unless like there's one day next year where we just everyone decides to have an extra new year's or something yeah yes yeah god yeah i mean

it's gonna it's gonna be maybe summer is gonna be like uh the fucking fall of Rome. People are just going to go insane. Do you think this will change the British social character in some way? No. No, I don't. People keep going, I wonder how this will change society. We're going to have a better appreciation for the social services

and the people who look after us and no we won't maybe for like a year people say remember what the nurses and the doctors did but we'll go back people always go back we always go back we're not we don't change people don't change so this that's why when people talk about the new normal i I'm like, no, the second we can go back, we will. And there's a reason people end up a certain way. And there's a reason society takes a certain shape. And I think part of it is changeable depending on, you know, new technologies or what becomes most convenient. But, you know, selfishness will return.

It didn't really go away. The office will return eventually. Like, yeah, I don't know. Society exists in a particular way for a reason, you know. So I don't think it will change the British psyche. I really don't. I think maybe we'll be appreciative for things, but appreciative not of other people, but of our own freedoms.

Yes, yeah. The conveniences we used to take for granted, but I sound like a cynic here, but I don't think that will fundamentally change. I think more people will wear masks. Yeah, I guess that probably makes sense. I know a few people who are like before the pandemic

they were the kind of people who say I just hate being sick. I'm so bad at being sick. I hate being sick. Those people are like big mask converts I think. Yeah, I guess I'm so one of those people that social distancing has sort of been fine for. Because I wasn't touching the stuff on the tube even before this all kicked off.

I mastered tube surfing. I can stand in the middle of the tube not holding anything and I won't fall over. Yeah. in the middle of the tube not holding anything yeah and i won't fall over yeah um and and i've not got sick once since march last year i've not got sick of anything once that's nuts isn't it nothing at all i i from time to time i get like a little scratch on my throat i'm like is this it and next morning i'm fine and i've just i've just not got sick at all i remember when when i might i might stick to not touching people for a while. I remember when we were recording when all this started happening.

And how is this for crazy listeners? I think we might have done more episodes of Budpod distanced through the plague than not. Yeah, it's mad. I look back at episode 52 and it's already a pandemic episode I'm like what? I could have sworn this was like maybe 30 episodes at most we've done like this

but yeah it's coming up to most of them now it's fucking crazy and I remember early on you saying how much you wanted to get it so you could have had it right isn't that interesting yeah I mean that was very much the thinking at the time we were still in

we were still in herd immunity mode back then everyone was everyone was doing it yeah we're all like how many old people

are we willing to sacrifice to keep living normally yeah and as we realized the number the number like there was a number this is

something we're not being honest with ourselves about there was definitely a number of all people willing to happily sacrifice but that number started getting too big even for the most callous of us to um to allow and and so we had to lock down but there was definitely a number well we did something very clever in this country which was we let as many of the old people die anyway as possible and then got rid of normal life

yeah really clever unique approach and also really clever of the Conservative Party to only do well right at the end. Because it seems that I'm not the only one who has been reading Daniel Kahneman's

Thinking Fast and Slow, Pierre. Because one of the lessons is the peak-end rule. And that is about how what you remember of an experience is the most intense moment, the peak, and how it ended. And it's an average between the two. Because the Tories, you know, with the vaccination program, have ended very well, presuming this is the end. People are likely to remember, to actually think of them quite positively,

as has been borne out in the recent council elections that's true yeah yeah we've we've we've got the trouble of as you say the vaccine the vaccine boost a booster booster jab they've got a booster jab from the voters um right right yeah they've got their second job they've been given immunity the the tory government has been given immunity from from the opposition for another fucking year till next winter yeah till till the opposition can mutate into a form that can bypass this immunity yes it's actually quite a good analogy i like this it is it is yeah when will labor find its escape variant leader yeah yeah when will labor finally choose a leader with an extended protein spike

capable of penetrating the outer cells of a tory majority I think Starmer is suffering from a case of lawyer brain. Explain. So if you have any friends who are lawyers, you might recognize the symptoms of lawyer brain, if not the term itself. If you spend your life in an incredibly um strict and formalized environment like the law and you know he's a qc and he took on news international and won and blah blah blah public prosecutor so he's like a very hard you know he's he's about as high as you can get as

a lawyer before they just make you a judge right it's his whole life. Law, law, law. Then that's just the way you think. It's how your brain thinks. Law, law, law. That's what lawyers say as they walk the walk. Law, law, law. And the judges go, judge, judge, judge. And the witnesses, yeah, the defendant,

crime, crime, crime. It's very easy to tell who's who in a court. So basically, he's got lawyer brain. And in court or in the law, if you say something reckless or that you can't prove, you get disbarred or fired or you go to jail. barred or fired or you go to jail. Like just last week or two weeks ago, a lawyer in Liverpool who represented a client through legal aid

like for free accepted a gift from the client's dad of like 100 quid, 150 quid. Fired. Done. Really? Done. Forever. For 100 quid?id 150 i think and they were like you have to you have to you have to turn it down gifts you can't have gifts the whole point of this is the fee is the fee and it does this and you can't it could be interpreted or misinterpreted it brings

the profession into disrepute blah blah blah you're done no more lawyering for you forever for your whole life crackers so it's an environment of heavy consequence whereas politics especially recently you can just come in anyone you want and everyone's fine with it you can come in someone and charge it to the british taxpayer somehow yes you could literally say i found an american businesswoman who seems like a person who'd have a disgusting affair with a politician from a cheap movie from a made for tv thriller she's she's very sort of sassy and and sort of like kind of bimbo-y and i'm gonna fuck her on her on a private jet and right before the Olympic ceremony as well, and no one's going to do a damn thing about it,

and I'm going to give her a hundred grand. Wait, what are you talking about? I don't know about this. Boris Johnson and Jennifer Arcuri. Oh, he was on a jet. I think they flew on a private jet on business trips together. That's pretty badass, actually.

I mean, there were other people on the jet. I'm not saying they fucked in a jet. Again, I must be careful because of the law. I have to be more careful than the Prime Minister's actual corruption. It's not funny. Yeah. On this podcast.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I gave her 100 grand. It's enough to make you mental health, Pierre. It's enough to give you mental health. It's really... The state of this country, it's enough to make you mental health it's enough to give you mental health it's really the state of this country is enough to give you mental health nothing gives me more mental health than boris johnson i think um he drives me fucking mental health but like it's amazing like she's come out and said that that she was riding his whatever his dick looks like on the couch in their house.

Right. Maybe it was in her flat. Hours before, he was at the Olympics opening ceremony as the Mayor of London, sat between Princess Margaret and his wife. What a day. What a fucking house of cards existence he's built for himself yeah yeah but he's done it he's bloody done it he's gone out there and he's lived the life we all secretly want to live do you think that's why people keep voting for him or do you think it's just rising property prices in northeastern regional areas. He's the Adam Sandler of politics.

He's the Sandman. He keeps making all this guff, yeah. But anyway, the point with Keir Starmer having lawyer brain is that it means he can't do, or he can't say the kind of stuff that gets good cut through, like rabble-rousing stuff, because he's incredibly professionally cautious. Yeah.

Yeah. He can't say we will give everyone free chocolate biscuits every day for the rest of their lives. Because he's going to go, that might be legally binding. Yeah, he can't just say would you leave the prime

minister alone with your wife because he'll go oh that could be defamatory oh that's very rude no we shouldn't focus on this incredibly niche you know policy people love policies, they don't. Why is politics seemingly

seemingly free of defamation law? I swear people in politics... Is there like some sort of tacit agreement, some honour amongst thieves that we can shit on each other and we won't sue each other? Well, it can... It's not defamation if it's honestly held opinion. Eh?

So you just have to prove that you really believe someone is a murderer? No, no, no, no, that's a crime. You're accusing them of a crime. That's not an opinion. Okay, okay. So if I say Phil does paintings and I think the paintings are shit not true but I'm still hurt

yeah I don't paint but I'm still hurt that's my opinion that's not defamatory that's my opinion on the work okay okay whereas if someone accuses you of something that isn't a crime but is bad,

you need to prove that it's damaged you somehow. You need to prove that someone emailed you and said, we're not going to hire you for the blah blah anymore because so-and-so accused you of being a rude, nasty boy. But then if the other person can prove that they truly believe me to be a rude, nasty boy, does that let them off? Well, maybe. It it could it just depends on the specifics of the case but then you'd have to go to court and then if you could prove damages

you could say well is it is it so true that it was worth me losing this money or this work or this reputation or whatever else and then there you have a very long expensive court battle the time where you don't have to prove a damn thing is if they accuse you of an imprisonable crime so murder sexual assault uh certain levels of fraud and corruption or whatever if the penalty could ever be prison then that automatically you can say well prove it or that's uh libel or slander slanderous slanderous scandalous but yeah j yeah Jennifer Akiri is just going around telling us all about All the different times Boris Johnson Spaffed in her and gave her money And everyone's just gone

Tee hee hee and just ignored it Yeah Well people don't give a shit We don't care I don't care I'm not a Boris Johnson fan and I don't give a shit who he spaffs in I don't care But he gave her a hundred grand Phil it doesn't matter

of whose money the London mayoral business development fund of your money she was developing his boner that's something she developed a business that's certainly true

it's just that the business was riding that terrifying blonde haystack of a man. And teaching IT or something to do with IT. Right. So I'm sure it's all fine actually Phil but wouldn't it be nice if someone looked into it properly or cared but they don't I mean people barely cared about Prince Andrew people just went

did you go to Pedo Island and he went yeah and everyone went oh that's terrible anyway I wonder what people care about now. It's an interesting thought experiment. What are people outraged by now? I really don't know. I feel like everyone is outraged by so many different things

that no one transgression could accumulate enough outrage to lose a job over. You know what I mean? There's too much outrage, and so no one knows where to spend their valuable outrage dollar. That's right. So I don't think... I'm not sure there's anything,

any one thing any one person can do in public office. I think it's still just being a pedo. Sorry? Being a pedo, being a nonce. Yeah. Yeah, that's probably it the miloianopolis rule yeah making a bunch of seemingly pro pedophilia points sort of vaguely saying that you think it's okay for much older priests to be extremely friendly with 14 year old boys and then even the far right will say okay no okay no no no no no yeah maybe that's it it's just gonna have to be an enormous game of of

to catch a predator that's that's if that's the only thing that matters, it's just about desperately trying to find some sort of proof that your political opponent is a nonce. What a future we have in store for SPL. Yeah, I just, yeah, having an affair? No, well. No, no one cares. No one cares!

Most of this country gets a divorce. This is a nation... That's true. That's very true. This is a nation of adulterers. No one gives a shit. This nation is sinful in the eyes of the Lord! You walk knee-deep in sin!

Yeah, I mean, the acceleration of sin in government mainly due to donald trump i mean he was doing he was doing something watergate worthy every day so the the point yeah like we've we've we've he he he rushed us through a century's worth of yeah moral numbing that's true that's a very good point I'd like you said the acceleration of sin first of all

excellent Christian rock band the acceleration of sin really good even for a Christian rock band but I just love the idea they pushed the both out a little because they were coming at it from the point of maybe being a bit pro-sin. Yeah, well, I think they got a lot of credit because the reason that they were so good

at getting the attention of young people is that they didn't pretend that the sinning wasn't attractive. Yeah, yeah. They didn't want to patronize the youth by pretending that sinning wasn't attractive yeah yeah they they didn't want to patronize the youth by pretending that sinning wasn't fun sinning is fun that's what makes it hard to avoid yeah and the young christians really appreciated that that candor that's it which they they don't get from any other part of the the church institution well that's it and and and as with all christian rock nothing more unnerving than seeing a bunch of young men dressed like blink uh 182 uh in a big group prayer

really odd extremely strange do you know that story about the um the uh what's it called the clown posse the insane clown posse insane clown posse. And they came out and admitted to everyone that they were hardcore Christians and all their music had been for the Lord. And all these fans were like what? So funny. I like the idea that the insane

clown posse were like the clue's in the name. What? Yeah it's all in there. It's all in there. Don all in there don't pretend you didn't notice the clown band or christian the whole time i i when you're saying acceleration of sin i like the idea of like a vicar standing in front of a big graph labeled sin and it's going up like a stock and he's tapping it with a pointer and going this is bad we don't want this we want this and he points tapping it with a pointer and going, This is bad.

We don't want this. We want this. And he points it pointing down. We want that. But currently he's doing this. Yeah, he turns the whole chart upside down. This is the goal, people. Sin to go down.

What I'm proposing is a deceleration of sin. Oh, that's right. Please, please. Calm down, please. Everyone. Please, please, brothers. I don't know how to decelerate. A monk standing up.

How do you propose such a thing? But it's funny, the acceleration of sin, as propagated by someone like Trump, has coincided with the acceleration of a kind of focused moral outrage in woke culture. Yeah. You know what I mean? There's more sin and more fury at the sin but their grievances have become so

specific and focused and in and of themselves tribal they split up like the church and the woke movement so that everyone has broadly similar but but slightly different

belief systems and these differences are more important than the similarities so yeah the small differences they have in belief over the rights of various minority groups make them hate each other and so yeah yeah the the the new moral outrage is so fragmented uh now that there's nothing we can all get behind as a single group that's true yeah whereas the right wing are always united they even just they'll even just be like well he's a republican that's not as good on gun control as i want him to be but i'll still vote for him because he's republican yeah yeah that's right yeah i guess yeah it's sort of like the early church where they go well everyone agrees that Jesus was the son of God

but this guy thinks he was entirely divine the whole time whereas I think he was divine in stages or he was half divine half mortal or he was mortal and then divine at the end and before you know it millions of people are dead in an enormous war

there's that amazing Emo Phillips joke yes the guy on the bridge yeah he's walking over a bridge and there's a guy about to jump do you remember it? I can't quite remember the wording of it yeah so he says

there's a guy about to kill himself on a bridge and he walks up to him and says hey hey hey don't you know don't don't kill yourself there's you have so much to live for and the guy says no i don't and he says like uh uh hey come on don't you you know you can't kill yourself don't you believe in god you know and the guy says of course i believe in god and then basically he goes well are you a christian yes i'm a christian well what are you are you a baptist the guy goes yes i am a baptist and Baptist. And they turn out to be like the both the same. Like, what are you, Baptist?

Are you a Northeast Synod of 1812 Baptist? And the guy goes, yes, I am Northeast Synod of 1812 Baptist. And they go, oh, my God. Well, I. And it goes on and on, incredibly specific. Like, wait, the church on the north side of town or the south side of town? And the guy goes, north side. And Emo Phillips goes, die, heretic!

And kicks him off the bridge. Kicks him off the bridge. Yeah, it's really good. Emo Phillips, this is relevant to you and me trying to remember that, has a great joke where he says, I never try and write any of my material down. I keep it where it's nice and safe in the heads of various british comedians maybe in the mines something like that yeah he's fantastic um god he's good yeah that's a

recommendation uh for you guys listeners if you don't know Emo Phillips he's one of the greats not unsung but not sung enough that's right that's right he's one of these comics people say oh he's weird

but not really he tells jokes for an hour they're just very good jokes but just because he does something weird while he's doing them. He'll always do something protracted and long for the entire, and unexplained for the entire show. So there's one where he's assembling a trombone for the first half hour while telling jokes.

And then he doesn't play it and then starts disassembling it until he finishes and then puts it back in the case. And when I saw him live in Edinburgh, he was just slowly throughout the whole hour just slowly pulling a pair of trousers out of his trousers there's a pair of trousers in there and he's just slowly pulling them out of the trousers he was wearing and that was it he didn't never reference it um that's so good it's such a funny thing um and yeah as you say people go he's weird but it's

the milton jones rule isn't it it's like what they mean is his hair's weird and he's dressed funny yeah but the stand-up is it's about as pure an example of stand-up as you can imagine it's pure jokes it doesn't really get purer than that. It's not the Mighty Boosh Live. It's not freewheeling surrealism. Yeah, I always think of that joke when I think about both hardcore religious people and hardcore online activists. Yes. Yes, online activist is no longer an oxymoron.

Yes. You can now just put activist in your bio. You can just put whatever your job is slash activist and people believe you. Imagine the confidence of someone who doesn't do face-to-face work with the vulnerable or their target group. Like actual daily, like I go to the shelter and I, you know.

Or I'm always writing petitions so i i'm a member of this charity and we do this and i i work there full time and i or like part-time and i do my other job or i care for my family not doing any of that just essentially writing blogs and going yeah i'm an activist yeah i'm helping. You know, my words in a way are the same as what all those other guys are doing. Activist. You know what it is? It's a symptom of years of people on Question Time saying that the solution to these intractable problems is that we need to have a conversation. We need to have the conversation. We need to have a frank conversation.

For years, I watched Crash and Time, and there'd be someone going, what needs to happen now about, like, whatever it is, like, whether it's gay marriage or class mobility, whatever the problem is, or racism, what needs to happen now is we need to have a frank conversation. And I'd just be thinking, this is the conversation. You're on question time.

If the point of conversations is to promise to have further conversations, I don't really see what the end point is. But because of that culture, we're now suffering the digital equivalent of that, which is that to solve the problem is simply to talk about the problem on Instagram. But it isn't. The conversation

itself is not the solution. But people are convinced that it is. Because it's the only thing they can do. And especially over the last year, the only thing we've been able to do is say things online. Endlessly have conversations about conversations about conversations. Yeah, it's conversations all the way down.

It's open and frank conversations all the way down. The franker the better. The franker the better, I say. Please make them open. We won't stop mental health until we have the frankest, most open conversation about it in history.

Yeah. We won't ever succeed in getting any more money for it. But I'm going to burst into various meeting rooms and I'm going to listen in on their conversations and I'm going to go, uh-uh-uh, Franker! I'm going to listen in on their conversations and I'm going to go, uh,

uh, uh, Frank. When I come back after my lunch break, I want to hear this conversation and you should all be ashamed of how unfranked this is. This is the least Frank thing I've ever heard in my life. You there be Frank. Excuse me.

You, what's your name, boy? How long you been here go on be frank for me when i get back after my meeting i want a whole lot more frankness in this room and if there's not then frankly you can all get out it's it's like um frank conversations are the uh well first of all i really enjoyed the first

album of frank conversation yeah frank conversation plays the blues of the 60s frank conversation yes yes yes yes his cover of uh Girl from Ipanema was great Frank conversations are the equivalent of when companies make people do unpaid overtime every day but then they can have a pizza right well it's just like no we won't pay you for the fact that we expect you to work till 9pm

but it's Friday's pizza day or when we used to do you for the fact that we expect you to work till 9pm but it's Friday's pizza day or when we used to do when you're starting out you do gigs for like there's no money but you can have a beer you can have a free beer from the bar that's exactly it yeah

trying to pay your rent in beer like some kind of medieval peasant Frank open and yeah and politicians saying let me be perfectly clear of medieval peasant. Frank, open and... Yeah, and politicians saying, let me be perfectly clear. I just think we need a... We need a frank, an open and frank conversation.

Well, let me be perfectly clear. I agree that we need a frank conversation. Which is that on a loop. Yeah. Yeah. That's activism now's activism now and it was question time then now it's activism now

yeah I just I guess like yeah that's the thing isn't it there's an element of people thinking that there's something a bit too early. And obviously you get it with stand-up. People saying, I'm a comedian.

And what they mean is they're an open mic. They do it as a hobby. Yeah. Yeah. And because there's no guild that can say, no, this person is not a charted comedian. Yeah. This person isn't on our scroll anyway so yeah that's it whereas where's like i mean you know your your friend and mine uh james acaster

oh yes you know the comedian and broadcaster that's right james acaster the comedian and broadcaster and fellow comedian broadcaster fellow, fellow podcaster, James Acaster. So he's done good stuff for mental health and talking about it. You know, he's done lots of talks and podcasts about it. And loads of people have gotten a lot out of that. And he's been praised for that. And rightly so. But he doesn't walk around calling himself an activist.

No. No. No. Exactly. walk around calling himself an activist no no um no exactly and i mean that's it's not something to it's not a job it's not a job to be an activist um it's not even an occupation it's a hobby at best well unless you work for a charity call yourself but then would you call yourself a charity worker instead of an activist if you worked in a charity you would yeah i was i don't i'd see like even now i'm realizing that the words kind of lost all meaning in my head it just kind of means this is something i talk about a lot it's also a kind of a class and perception thing an activist the activist is like it's actually a very middle class profession. And saying

that I'm a charity worker it doesn't have the glitz that an activist has. I just from my own curiosity I went on Google and I typed in define activist. I mean it used to mean something very concrete. It used to mean

you went out onto the street every day with a megaphone until you were thrown in prison. You're a campaigner. A person who campaigns to bring about political or social change. Oh, is that... But then where's the campaign? It's like a blog, it's not a campaign. I also...

It's quite funny. Under people also ask, what activist means? I love those automatic questions that have somehow... How have the most grammatically incorrect formations of these questions become the suggested questions on Google? How many times have people mistyped this question that Google has gone,

this must be the correct form of this question? Yeah. How many... What means activist? How many grandma cavemen went, what activist means? Hey, you go out, you hunt. No grandma, me no hunt, me activist.

What activist means? A baffled grandma caveman. It's all the result of the gradual degradation of language and the stretching of language to the limit of its meaning, where phrases like, we need to organize, or we need to resist, or we're doing the work, or whatever. And so because these words are starting to mean nothing you can use any words you like because there is no

there's nothing you need to qualify it with because it itself means nothing. So an activist means nothing. Anyone can be one. And that's where we're at now. Yeah, it's true. Anyway, thanks for listening to the Sam Harris podcast with...

Never forget, listeners, you are listening to the only officially anti-murder podcast. Yes, of course. How could we forget? We are anti-murder activists. We believe that murder is bad and wrong. Oh, yeah. And it's frankly disgusting

that we're the only anti-murder podcast we dream of a world where every podcast feels obliged to say that they are anti-murder at the start and end of every episode why are they so afraid Pierre this is what I want to know why are the podcasts at the start and end of every episode. Why are they so afraid, Pierre?

This is what I want to know. Why are the podcasts so afraid to say they're anti-Pierre? Anti-Pierre, anti-murder. What, what, I mean, I can't imagine a podcast that's anti-Pierre. Certainly not this one. No. But why are the other podcasts so resistant to being anti-murder?

Who's gotten to them? That's what I wanted to say. You know what, Phil? Their silence is deafening. It really is. And it's disgusting, frankly, which is another great podcast. Another... What the fuck is happening to my words? Another great Question Time catchphrase. It's disgusting, actually.

I've actually... I think more than once or a couple of times I've been able to, watching Question Time Live, sing along with someone in the audience and I know when they're going to say it's disgusting

and I've been able to sing along watching. With your... And it's disgusting I say it along with you. With your Zippo lighter like waving lit. It's disgusting.

Sing along question time. It's such a funny idea. Let me be perfectly clear. People are kind of waving. If you could just let me finish. If you could just let me finish. Oh, that's fucking great. A frank and open conversation.

Yeah. That's the end. Yes. Yes. Yes. Well, frankly, listeners, time for the end. And although this has been an open conversation,

it's time to close the podcast. It's time to close the podcast. Keep jacking it. Stay anti-murder. Stay anti-murder. Please remember Pian and I are comedians, but we're also anti-murder activists we think murder is wrong

we think murder is wrong and frankly we won't stop until everyone else does too and come see me at the Soho Theatre at the end of this month the most important take home message is go to see Pierre at the Soho Theatre later this month if that's a logistically viable thing for you to do.

Yes, 23rd to the 29th. The 23rd or 24th? Oh no, shit, 24th, you're right. I'm a stupid fucker. Oh no. 24th of May. Go to the Soho Theatre website and look for my name is the easiest thing.

24th of May to the 29th of May. There we go. Don't confuse him with the other Piano Valleys, though. Yeah. One of us always tells lies. I won't say which it is. But have a good week, everyone. God, this is our final...

Well, yes. This is our final No Indoor Dining podcast, Pierre. Oh, yeah. God, that's true. well yes this is our final no indoor dining podcast Pierre oh yeah god that's true irreversibly I remind you irreversibly this is our irreversibly last no indoor dining

episode of Budpod gosh that's mad isn't it yeah brave new world yeah um great well isn't it yeah brave new world yeah um great well bye everyone I guess bye