Factually! with Adam Conover - Stand Up Comedy with Tourette's with Benny Feldman

Episode Date: October 15, 2025

Benny Feldman is one of the funniest new comics working today. He also has Tourette Syndrome, a neurological condition characterized by involuntary vocalizations and tics. Not only does this give Benny a unique rhythm to his performances, it also has helped him develop a fascinating personal understanding of how humor even works. This week, Adam talks with Benny about Tourette’s, comedy, and the power that comes with understanding yourself. --SUPPORT THE SHOW ON PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/adamconoverSEE ADAM ON TOUR: https://www.adamconover.net/tourdates/SUBSCRIBE to and RATE Factually! on:» Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/factually-with-adam-conover/id1463460577» Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0fK8WJw4ffMc2NWydBlDyJAbout Headgum: Headgum is an LA & NY-based podcast network creating premium podcasts with the funniest, most engaging voices in comedy to achieve one goal: Making our audience and ourselves laugh. Listen to our shows at https://www.headgum.com.» SUBSCRIBE to Headgum: https://www.youtube.com/c/HeadGum?sub_confirmation=1» FOLLOW us on Twitter: http://twitter.com/headgum» FOLLOW us on Instagram: https://instagram.com/headgum/» FOLLOW us on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@headgum» Advertise on Factually! via Gumball.fmSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This is a headgum podcast. I don't know the truth. I don't know the way. I don't know what to think. I don't know what to say. Yeah, but that's all right. That's okay. I don't know anything.

Hey there, welcome to factually. I'm Adam Conover. Thanks for joining me on the show again. You know, normally on this show, at least when we got started, we were only having experts, authors, scientists, journalists, people like that. The more we've done this show, the more I just wanted to have on people who I think are interesting, who I really want to talk to, who I think have a interesting perspective on the world that you might not have heard before and that can show you how things look from their little corner of the universe. And we have one of those interviews for you today. This week on the show, I have one of my very very favorite new comics who I think you probably haven't heard of, but I think you're going to hear a lot more about soon. His name is Benny Feldman. I saw him for the first time in New York a couple years ago. He's an absolutely incredible, unique joke writer with a very strange way of looking at the world. He does one-liners, very sweet, almost psychedelic comedy. He also happens to have Tourette syndrome, which manifests in a really interesting way in his comedy. I think he uses that condition in a way that's very different from the way a lot of other comics do, or at least

that I find very interesting as a comedian. And also the way he talks about it on stage really makes me interested in Tourette's itself as a condition of what the experience of having it is like. And, you know, I started talking with him about it off mic, you know, just in the process of getting to know each other. And it really made me start thinking differently about myself and my own sort of neurological differences from other people and how those show up in my comedy. So he happens to be in L.A., and I said, you know what, let's get Benny on the show and talk about all this stuff, because I think he's just a fascinating guy, really sweet, incredibly funny person, and if you haven't heard of his comedy, I know you're going to be a fan after this interview. Now, before we get to it,

I want to remind you that if you want to support the show and all the conversations we bring you every single week, head to patreon.com slash Adam Conover, five bucks a month. Every episode of the show, ad-free, community book club, all those other great things, Patreon.com slash Adam Conover. And if you want to come see me do stand-up comedy live on the road, well, coming up soon, I'm headed to Tacoma, Washington and Spokane, Washington in October, Des Moines, Iowa, and Atlanta, Georgia in November, followed by Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. On November 15th, I'll be at the Bell House in Brooklyn for the New York Comedy Festival.

Benny himself is going to be opening for me at that show. And then after that, in December, I'll be in Washington, D.C., at the Lincoln Theater, and Pittsburgh, PA at Bottle Rocket Social Club. head to Adamconover.net for tickets I'd love to see you out there. And now, without further ado, let's get to this conversation with a very funny, very interesting, Benny Feldman. Tretz is sort of the abstract art of disabilities.

A lot of people are like, I could do that. I want to record an album in front of, of an entirely Tourette's crowd and released us the first experimental noise album in comedy. Shit fucking. All right, that's all the Tourette's stuff I'm going to do for now, dude.

I don't give a fuck about it. Shit fucking. I feel like regional pizza is just like one Italian guy went to a city in 1910 and forgot how to make pizza. He like put the sauce on top of the cheese.

Somebody's like, Yo, you fucked up. He's like, it's Chicago. Shit fucking. My roommate's been recording a lullaby album. So at night I'd have to bang on his door, I go, hey, turn that up. I'm trying to sweep.

Shit, fucking. Went on a date recently, and the girl said, Jill had Emily Dickinson only became famous after she died. I was like, oh, word. That's the same for dinosaurs. If you're a squirrel who lives underwater in a biodome

And your best friend is a sponge You might be a redneck Dude Benny, thanks for being on the show man Good to be here, dude What's on? Thanks for having me on I'm so excited to have you on

You've been one of my favorite comics Since the first time I saw you a couple years ago and your stuff, you do really well on the internet too. Why do you think that is? I appreciate that.

Well, my jokes are short. And so it's a short form situation. People complain, they're like, ah, they got to fit your jokes into a clip and I'm like, it's fine for me. And you like put up clips of the, you'll like remix,

you'll do the same joke in a clip, it'll be in a different part of the clip or whatever. I try to do that. If I put a joke out, I try to not do the same joke for like a year or so or like a certain amount of time

because people notice you know what I mean? I'm not trying to just spam the same clown car joke or whatever over and over again. Yeah, how'd you get in a comedy? Oh,

you're jumping all over. Okay. I've had different friends who have kind of like pushed me. Yeah. So like improv back in the day or stand-up improv was my friend Patrick West was like,

you should try out for the college improv team. And then I did And I was like, oh, shit, this is a lot of fun. And I ended up doing that. And then my friend Lauren Ellis was like, we should do standup sets. But we were underage and we weren't able to like get into the bar and we kind of chickened out. But I really liked writing the standup set. So then I kind of kept going with that.

And then I ended up doing like Drexel open mics. That's the college I went to. You did not do the open mics because you were worried you get kicked out for being underage. The ones in the ones in Philadelphia. Yeah. Because in fact, I actually did sneak in to one when I was 19. and the guy shout out Pete Steele

who I then met later he crowd worked me he was like dude you look like you're way too young to be in this bar right now and I like was and I was like all right

I won't come back until I'm allowed it's like I got called out immediately but the comic's not getting you kicked out of the bar oh yeah but the bartender noticed yeah yeah okay

the comic is alerting everybody around everybody in the room noticed yeah yeah uh and tell me about the Tourette's piece like how does that interact with your with your work no I've got Tourette's syndrome um it's uh I have it I mean I'm not that interested in um jokes about it I mean I am you know I just I just do have it and that's sort of like a neutral thing to me and I am interested in you know that sort of that representation side of things

being like, yes, you know, I've got Tourette's and it's okay. Well, you do, let me, let me take it back. The reason I ask, running through the, is, should we start over? No, I don't know. You're a good joke writer. Oh, thank you for saying so. That's really nice of you. My joke writing I craft is like more obvious when it's tight the way that you do it, you know?

I appreciate. I think I, well. I'm just doing jokes and you're doing also sort of stories and narrative and long form ideas structure. Yeah. And so you kind of,

it's within that space. You know what I mean? Yeah, but when I write a joke, I feel like I hope, I'm like, I want to say something and then I put some words together in a way that I hope we'll get like a reaction, but I'm like, it's probably not going to.

Like I hope that it does just because I want to get the thought out and I wanted to get over with the audience and I know they expect a punchline and then I'm sort of like pleasantly surprised after doing that for a while oh I've like written a bunch of things that people recognize as joke but it's like rarely my intention

to like write a specific joke does that make sense? Oh that's really interesting. I feel like yours are like you're like I've got you I can feel you crafting it. I've got like almost the opposite thing where like sometimes I'll tell a joke and somebody will be like

oh that has this secondary narrative meaning and I'm like what? I didn't intend that But you know I'm very intentionally Like trying to write like A hyperbole or a metaphor or something Yeah and your stuff is very like

I almost want to say psychedelic a little bit When I talk about your material It's it's it You're one of those comics when I watch you I'm like Yours is like Adderall Yeah Yeah that's my

It's like A little too intense and try hard And a little bit like Whoa take it I wish this guy could relax The first act you can snort. Yours is like when I watch you, I'm like, oh, I wish my mind works the way that yours works. I appreciate it.

When people tell me that I'm like, I don't think that my mind is some sort of like specific, unique thing. I think I'm doing knowable idea structures. You know what I mean? Yeah. And I'm like, also people will be like, oh, I want to live your mind. And I'm like, I'm just, I'm eating the sandwich. You know what I mean? Like I appreciate.

I appreciate that as the compliment, but I also, I think that it's, it's like, it's like cooking. Like, I think there's like knowable things you can do. You know what I mean? There's like a recipe that you can put together to make a joke. Yeah. Yes. I do actually believe so. Yeah.

And a lot of people, everybody disagrees with me, but I'm like, well, your recipes are just bad. You know what I mean? I don't know. It's like, not to be formulaic. Yeah. But that's like, you know, you don't like eat a delicious chicken pie. Costa or something and go like, it's a little derivative. You're what I mean? It's like, you still have to be good.

Yeah, comedy is structure like anything else does. Of course. But let's get into the Tourette's piece a little bit. Absolutely. Because what I think is interesting about the way that you write about it, it's part of your act. It's you seem to be aware that when people see you for the first time, it's like the most obvious memorable thing.

Of course. Right? They're like, oh, hold on. Oh, this is interesting. Well, I kind of want to see this. But your act is a. about it in an interesting way. You do have jokes about it, but you're not...

Tell me how you think about it. Totally. Okay, I was kind of saying I don't care about it before, but I do... It's more of like a... That I'm a little bit numb to it, or it's like very like, you know, I don't know. I don't think... It's not like I'm actively thinking about it. It's like a pressing matter to me.

Yeah. I do care about it in the sense of like, you know, I would like the crowd to have a more positive idea of people. people with Tourette's or to get rid of any sort of stereotypes I might have in their mind about like, oh, people with Tourette's are also weird in XYZ way because I think there is a, um, especially when you're like a kid, kids with Tourette's are often ostracized and there can be a sort of like, uh, I think like downward spiraling pattern or social reinforcement thing where like they get forced to be weird or they're seen as weird. And so then like, you know what I mean. Um, so I think people have a, um, so I think people have a, can possibly have a negative opinion of Tourette's or something. But people also have... I don't know if that's true, but... They also have a certain positive fascination with it.

Like, of all of the disabilities or conditions one could have, it's one that I think people find more interesting than others, right? Well, honestly, people are really weird to me about it. People will tell me I'm, like, brave for performing with Tourette's, and I'm like, that's crazy. That's ridiculous. Like, well, it's like, as if it's something that I should be. be afraid of having or embarrassed about or something and I'm like, what are you talking about?

Or like, it's like they, they think that I shouldn't. I don't know. Or like, um, does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah. Well, it came, the onset of it was for you was like later in life, right? Yeah. I had, I had milder tibilder tics growing up. I had like more of like a, um, like a head shaking one and like a throat clearing thing. Um, and I had longer hair. So we thought it was me getting my hair of my eyes, but when I got a haircut, that's when my parents said that they realized that it was something else because they were like, I kept doing it. But then when I was...

I kept doing like the head shake stuff. Oh, they like thought that you were just getting your hair out of your eyes and then you got a haircut and they were like, he's still trying to get his fucking hair. That's right. That's right. Phantom hair. What's going on with this kid?

I actually don't have Tourette. I just have phantom mullet. That's what I got. But I did have like a mullet for a while. But yeah, basically. when I was like 21 I did psychedelics and that has some sort of

serotonin thing that it does and Tourettes it seems to be a serotonin imbalance I don't know for sure if that is what caused it because I also have family members who also had late onset Tourette. And you had some ticks before that?

I had some ticks before. I think that the psychedelics exacerbated it. It's hard to exactly tell the timeline. The timeline is like sort of like I did them. And then I, okay, and then I had kind of like hallucinations and stuff. Like I, I'm, it seems like I'm probably predisposed to like schizophrenia and stuff like that

because I was having like auditory hallucinations and paranoia for a while. But as that kind of faded in, it's kind of like this eight-month timeline where I started have Tourette's and I, I'm dead honest with you. I straight up think that some of the noises I was hearing in my head, I'm just doing out loud. Wow. But that's so, that's really like anecdotal pseudos. science that they need to study it in like a more controlled I'm going to guess you're not doing psychedelics anymore no no it really listen I would love to but I yeah you're really afraid

like a psychedelic kind of you seem like that kind of guy yes you seem like you seem like you could be a white guy with dreadlocks at a fish concert and you maybe not the dreadlocks but absolutely maybe if I did enough and I was like right you're wearing cut off jeans shorts that you embroidered yourself that's right I messed up this dragonfly I got to fix him but yeah but you're no more you're like this this would make things worse. I'm very afraid that it would. People always ask, they're like,

well, have you tried doing psychedelics again? And I'm like, that's crazy. To undo it? To undo it is the, what I don't know, I think it's, you got to, you need new friends, man.

It's like the worst advice. I literally think there's something to that, but I don't want to do it though. Well, it's funny about psychedelics because people say, there's so much research and people talking about like the benefits of psychedelics and like the metaphor people use it's like,

you're like reshuffling the cards or something. You're like opening up new pathways. Yeah. But like maybe there's some pathways that shouldn't be opened in some cases. Dude, I feel bad being like a little bit of a poster child for like, don't do it. Because I'm kind of like, listen. Do it. You know what I mean?

I'm like, I don't know. But, but and yet, maybe not if you have a family history of schizophrenia and you've got some, uh, some recurring tics and things like that. Maybe it's something to be aware of. Yeah, you know, I don't have a family history of schizophrenia, so I wasn't, so I wasn't afraid of that. No, why, it seems like I might, or like some sort of latent thing, but I do have a family history of, like, pretty intense OCD stuff. So that's what I've got with Tourette's as well. Does OCD go with Tourette's?

It can often, very frequently comorbid, yeah. Yeah, they kind of seem like there's something in common, right? Because OCD, having the experience of like there's a thought you can't get out of your, a thought you can't stop thinking. I literally think of OCD as slow wave Tourette. Like Tourette's like, I'm very like, like, but then like OCD is more like for 10 minutes. I'm like, got to touch my head. You know what I mean? You know, does that make sense?

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things and its severity levels are different um my Tourette's looks more severe but I do think that when I'm calm it's more calm um and I have one thing called the premonetory urge where If I feel it coming, I can stop it if I want to. But, okay, I'll go down that path in a second. And then the other thing is that I'm able to redirect them to some degree. So some people will have physically painful Tourette's tics. I have those once in a while. Like it's painful.

Like the urge is painful or the tick that you do is painful to yourself? Not that the urge is painful. But I'll come back to that in a second because that is a little bit of a different thing. Okay. But the tick itself, people have things where they, like, hit themselves, or strain different muscles or do some things so frequently that it can make certain muscles sore. Yeah. The main ones that hurt myself are, like, I'll have, like, I've got neck pulling ones that I've done every now and again. And that fucking sucks.

I've done it on stage, like, a few times. I just have to, like, power through it. I'm like, okay. I'm going to talk about, I don't know, the Lorax or something. yeah but yeah um the premonitory urge thing people say that Tourette's is unvoluntary as opposed to involuntary um involuntary is you know you you're forced to do it uh or whatever but onvoluntary is like blinking where like you can hold blinking if you need to but most of the time it just happens automatically uh huh but then uh like blinking but right i can hold my eyes open right like for a bit

if I try, but only for so long. Exactly. And then when I'm not thinking about it, I'm just like constantly blinking. I'm not thinking about it. And I can also blink on purpose if I like. Exactly. And that's stimming.

Yeah, yeah. Oh, like if I were to blink a lot, maybe it makes me feel better because I'm stimming in some way. Exactly. And we can talk about how stimming is different in autism and Tourette's a little bit as well. Yeah, yeah.

But yeah, it's called involuntary. And just the one to wrap that idea up, if you hold your eyes open for a while, you really feel like you have to blink or whatever. Yeah. Same for holding the Tourette's. If I hold the Tourette's for too long, it's like a, yeah, it's just like a really,

that sensation, extremely hard to describe the internal sensation. Yeah. But it's just this deep urge to do it. Yeah. The actual thing itself can just kind of feel like a muscle spasm or tensing or something, but it can feel good. If you were to like, like, how long can you hold, can you hold it? Oh, wow.

I don't think, you know, hmm, I've never done in a long-term endurance, like a staring contest, but with my body. That's funny. It's the kind of thing. It's the kind of thing you do when you're a kid where you're just like, oh, how long can I hold my breath? How long can I go without doing this or that? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I'm almost surprised you, you haven't been like, well, well, let me just, let me just see.

Well, it becomes a little, I mean, I guess it becomes. So it doesn't become uncomfortable quickly that typically I haven't tried to hold it for as long as I can. But what I do is I redirect it. Yeah. Not everybody can do that. But the metaphor that they use for this one is like, imagine you're sledding down the hill. And you can, if you keep sledding down the same path, that becomes more and more of like the sledded path. And so your sled goes that way.

But you can try to go a different way. And if you do that enough times, the snow will cover the other path and you'll make a new path. That's what they call. that's how you like you kind of redirect ticks interesting so for example you know I've done a couple slurs that I don't want to be doing

and I go and I have to go like all right we're going we're going a different we're going a different slur yeah we're going you know what I mean or in a situation where I have to hold it we're going a difference yeah yeah a slur for

how about a slur for people that that nobody likes or a slur for somebody who nobody has any problem and then I start making on new ones Yeah, so you can like I almost I just almost say fuck

And I'm like no It's time to say the N word You know I love one of the few white boys With the actual pass And I don't use it You're welcome America You have a pass

Because you have a condition But you're like But I don't I'm not going to Wow Incredible I literally could be saying The N word all the time

I don't know Anyway But no you You redirect in a different direction Look at that immense restraint. So you told me once, like, the ticks, like, come and go, like you'll have, like, a period of one tick being sort of dominant, and then it'll be less so, or can you, like, get yourself out of the pattern of one so that you...

For sure. For sure. I don't like this one. I want to stop doing it, and then you can work your way away from it. Yeah, my newest one is New York. That fucking rocks. Like, if you're... I mean, you live.

in New York, you walk around, and you just go, New York. Nobody has a problem with that. It started in L.A. While I've been here, it started. And I think it, like, it was like a little bit of a joke at first, but then I kept doing it. And I was like, oh, no, I've done this to myself. So it was just a joke you had said a couple times in conversation. And then you said it too many times and you felt it like dig in as a tip.

Yeah, yeah. Wow. Yeah, that's, yeah, exactly. So sometimes I'll say something that just like, oh, hard to describe. but feels nice and smooth. And then it's like, and then yeah, it kind of settles into place,

latches on. Wow. It's like a little worm. It's a little barnacle on the whale of the ship. Are there certain kinds of things that, you know, are more likely to become ticks than others, or other words are movements?

Okay. Well, so this kind of comes back to what we're talking about with redirecting it and stuff and why I don't hold it for as long as I do. What I'll do is if I've got like a tick that I don't like or something, I'll redirect it to one that I don't, don't mind doing or is more comfortable or it's fine for my body or is more enjoyable or something like that. And so those have more staying power typically just because they don't

suck as much to do. So like this one, that one has been one of my longest ones for a while now because I like it. I like that too. I'm used to hearing you do that from hanging out. It's one of the hits. You got to play the hits. Yeah, it's like kind of comfy. It's like a nice sound you know it's like uh you know what it also sounds like one of the reasons i like it it sounds like a raven ravens make that sound and i you hear them all around l-a yeah ravens will do like a crow who want other difference between crows and ravens people are always asking me i don't what's the difference between a crow and a raven and among other differences crows are smaller ravens tend to fly higher but crows kind of go crack right but ravens do

all these low clicking sounds like they'll do like groans and grumbles and they also will basically make that like oh yeah yeah if you're in like you go in Griffith Park and you listen you'll hear that sound

cool yeah nice you're made that's a raven tick one of what yeah that's neat yeah it's an omen of death if I do it at you

you're fucked yeah yeah and I think I confirm my own death every time I hear you do that yeah I do I do have a vision of a skull it's not my only bird tick

I've got not that one but I've got like kind of like a it's hard you know it's weird sometimes they're hard to do without automatically doing them but kind of like I go like I've been kind of like making bird noises with my teeth that's a nice one of something yeah this redirection and that kind of thing and and actually you're going to say how do you how do you undo a tick you know redirected a lot of times yeah

as many times just it takes to and then I stop then you gently stop feeling that one's kind of pressure yep but yeah not but not everybody with Tourette's has to be to redirect or can see them coming, which is called the pre-monetory urge. That's what I was going to ask is that there are folks with Tourette's who have less ability to redirect or control than you do. Yes. And the pre-monetory urge, I'd say, it feels like I'm Neo in the Matrix, or like, you know, the bullets are me on a slur on the subway.

And I'm like, that's me redirecting it then. You eat it. Yeah, it's me eating it and taking it to, you know, Neo, if he was a bird. Now, how, are there ways in which it makes your daily? Like this idea of the Matrix, but with birds? Hold on. They're making, like, making a nest out of ones. Oh, ones and zeros?

Oh, they're like in the Matrix. Yeah. They're like, they're digital birds. Yep. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'd say that's all I got for that. I mean, I would try to add on to it, but it's a very specific scenario you posited. All the agent Smiths.

Yeah, they fill their nest with Agent Smith sunglasses. Yeah. Yeah, there you go. Does it, are there ways in which makes your life a lot harder or are you? Not for me personally. Different people with Tourette's, yes, I would say so. It's one of those, okay, some people with Tourette's, it's causing real physical harm or it's causing employment, difficulty in certain, you can't do certain jobs and stuff. me personally and for a lot of people with Tourette's it's more of like a light social

um the embarrassment uh type thing but I I'm I don't know I'm a little bit like I don't care like I don't care like but I think that's part of what I want to do with the comedy a little bit with my messaging with the Tourette's yeah it's also like who gives the shit you know what I'm in a in a um and I like I think it is good to care but it's also like a little bit of like Okay, it doesn't, like, I'm making these noises, but it's like, that's fine. You know what I mean? You know, there's no reason for that to matter. Everybody makes noises, clears their throat and sneezes and coughs and makes little sounds

and stuff. So it's like talking to you, it becomes very normal. Yeah, it's like background noise, little white noise. And I, I want to say. It's like putting on your podcast while going to bed. It's like white noise. Putting on my podcast. I don't know why I did a dig.

I just don't be funny to do a dig. No, that's fine. It's a very, you know, it's, it's pretty sedent. date. There's not that many laughs. Mostly, I'm just talking to academics who speak in quiet voices. Yeah. By the way, that came to mind from the idea of, uh, in your hour talk, when you were talking about listening to audio books while also doing other things. Right. Yeah. That's my, I was trying to do a joke based on your joke. I was clear that. I appreciate that. No, yeah. That's, I mean, that's was a way that I deal with ADD was try to do that like sort

sensory overload kind of thing or like fill every, uh, every orifice with like something. to do, you know, um, you find it usually to take tests if you had like gum or something. Say again. Oh, like if you were like, yeah, chewing gum helps focus on a test. Yeah, chewing gum or like having something to fidget with, having something to hold, you know, helps you focus. Uh, if I'm watching a movie, it can be helpful to have something like that because otherwise I'll like, if I'm watching a movie alone at home, I'll like pull my phone out during the movie. And that part of that's a phone problem, but it's also like, you know, my, my eyes and my ears are occupied, but something's missing, you know, like.

I want to touch or I want to do some other thing. Right. But I also, you mentioned stimming and like. Yeah, I want to come back to your ticks and stuff. Yeah. When I talked to you, you made me think about how like I have had stuff that I would loosely call a tick. I mean, it's not, it's not how that ended up in your hour was we kind of chatted about. Maybe a little bit.

I wasn't in your hour when I saw you. Yeah. And then I saw the final thing. I was like, wait a damn second. Yeah, you opened for me in Baltimore and in New York. and then I eventually added some stuff about, yeah, how I have a couple like ticks

that helped me with the ADD. I think it got me started thinking about it. Now I've got a mouth guard. Really? Yeah, yeah. We're all picking up things from each other. Yeah, I mean, like, for a long time, I've had like a thing where I'll go,

especially when I'm alone, I'll go like, like that, like I'll sort of, when I'm with other people a lot of times, I'll rub my face and I'll make like a little sound like that or I'll like, you know, slap my chest door like, I'll do this. You're gonna give me some of these. Oh, I'm sorry.

No, you're good, but yeah. I don't mean to. No, it's all right. Trigger. People with Tourette's trigger each other like Alexis, as they say. Hey, Siri. Hey, Siri. Hey, Siri.

Hey, Siri. Um, yeah, it, like, it's something I've done for most of my life, usually when I'm by myself and I sort of like think of it as like a bit of excitement or something, you know, um, like, if I just. I don't know, if I had a good Zoom meeting, what a horrible sentence. But like, you know, and I'm like in a good mood. And then I'm like, go to the kitchen. I'm making some food.

I might go like like, like, like, like, let a little bit of steam out. And, you know, I think a smaller version of that if I'm in public, if I'm on a plane, like, maybe I'll like rub my nose a lot or like scratch my arms or something. The rub your nose one is one where I am doing it so constantly in my stand up. And I, you know, Zhijak? Slajov, Zijik? Yeah, yeah, that guy. Yeah. I'm constantly doing the thing that he does.

Oh, does he do that? He's, like, doing that all the time. And so am I, like, on stage and I'm like, I don't want to be doing that. Something about the nose. It just feels a little gross. Goes to the brain stem, I don't know. But, yes, it doesn't disgust to touch your nose so often. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And I worry about that. I feel a little snotty on stage, and I'm kind of like, I'm kind of like, I would like to have a different dig. So I wish I had a tick where I was just like, like, just, just, mewing or whatever it's like that insult thing where they talk about like sticking your chin out to look like sexy

if your tick was my tech was you looking hot yeah yeah exactly striking a sexy pose doing a perfect like bodybuilder pose yeah new tick where I fucking beat the shit

out of the ground my new tick is I just have to bench press like but do you think that what I experience which has never really been bothersome

or a big part of my life. Is there a similarity between that and a Tourette's tick in any way in your mind? Absolutely. I mean, Tourette's on the, it's a type of tick disorder. It's under that umbrella. And what you would have would be perhaps some sort of tick disorder, maybe comorbid with like the ADHD or some shit. I don't know.

But I'm not a doctor, though. I'm not a doctor. I have Tourette's and I've been on Wikipedia. Which, by the way, it's interesting that, okay, the diagnosis criteria for Tourette's was that it was like, you have to have vocal and motor ticks. That's like the main thing. And one of the other ones is like, you have to be under 18. And I'm like, well, I was and I did have it.

But then I kind of like really shifted after 21. So I'm like, maybe I just have like an old adult onset tick disorder beyond like a, I don't know. It's hard to. Yeah. I don't know. Well, you really get into the territory of the human mind is mysterious. Right. And, like, how does this stuff happen and what do we call it? Yeah.

And the labels that we give these different, like, you know, neurological phenomena are to some degree, like, made up and the borders are fuzzy. Absolutely. But, like, I guess I wouldn't identify as having a disorder because I don't think it, like, interferes with my life and people in the ADD community. You know, I have had someone notice before when I was working on a show and it was like sort of a high tense moment. one of the executives asked one of my partners like, why is Adam like rubbing his face so much? And that really pissed me off because

I was like, I don't want to be observed in that way. Like, who gives a shit? You know? Like, I'm not hurting anybody. You know what I mean? But it was, there been like one or two times. That was like, again, a high stress environment and I was sort of like, you know, maybe behaving a little bit, uh, I was a little bit agitated for a week or so.

Well, I think that, I think that ticks, especially like, tick disorders, you know, it's similar to nervous sticks and they can height. So in stress or anxiety or embarrassment or whatever, they do heighten. Yeah. Yeah. I guess what I'm wondering is because my first connection with it was, you know, when people in the ADD, ADHD community talk about stimming. Oh, maybe that's more what it's like. Um, but the more we talk about it,

the more I wonder like is how much can most people relate in their lives to having the feeling of oh if i make this little movement i'll let some steam out yeah i'll get a little relief and maybe people have that to varying degrees and you know Tourette's is perhaps a a concentration of that feeling in some way it could you agree with that at all no that makes complete sense um yeah i mean because i don't know what to degree all the people feel the thing i'm feeling um but yeah like stimming in the Tourette's community means doing the take on purpose because it can feel good to do that. And then I guess in the autism

or other communities it can mean sort of doing those as like more of like a self-soothing thing is. But I don't know a degree to which those are necessarily different. And it's hard to tell. And that's the thing in my own experience. I'm like which of those is it and how do I classify? All I mean is when I met you and we started talking about this stuff,

it made me reflect on my own experience. Oh, sure. Of like, oh, yeah, okay. There's a little, I relate to a little bit of this sometimes in my life to a lesser degree. And I find that really interesting. I think that is one of the valuable things about you sharing it with people. Yeah. Yeah.

As that other people get to go, oh, me too. Yeah. Well, I got a little bit. No, it's like, it is. Yeah. And if I can help validate people's like little experiences where they're like, oh, when I'm at the doctor, I know I go like this or whatever. And they're like, oh, I know where that's coming from now or something. I don't know.

Just like, yeah, like like leg shape. a lot of people do. It's like, you know, so common. Let's talk about how you integrated into comedy. Like, first of all, I notice when you're on stage, you do it more. You do more ticks than when, you know, just like having a conversation with you right after the show. Why is that? Yeah, absolutely.

That's going to be the heightened of adrenaline, the nerves, anxiety, et cetera. I honestly think it's interesting because I think it's like a homeostasis type thing where when I'm like, normal and chilling I have the fewest takes but if I have caffeine or sugar or something

or adrenaline or nerves I have more but also if I don't have enough caffeine like if I go lower oh wow if I'm too like if I'm kind of depressed

or have like downers or something like alcohol or something but that could be like an inhibition release I also have more so I have the least when I'm like

normal amount of coffee or like you know what I I mean, it's weird. Yeah. What's a normal amount of coffee? I try to have like one cup a day. Or like one, you know. Fuck, I start with, I start with three.

Dude. Yeah. But every cup is fucking different. So every day I'm like, you know. The cold brew at this place? I mean, I'm not touching that shit. I had some of this at the top of the interview. And then we're talking about like rubbing my face.

And I have like an overwhelming urge to like constantly touch my nose now partially. But it feels like the cold brew. It's like the cold brew is fucking in there. When I do it, does it make you feel it? I think talking about it, yes. I'm experiencing I have more of an itchy face than usual, right? But also it happens, you know, I think it's connected to nervousness. I was on a date the other day and I felt myself like doing it a lot.

And I was like, and I literally started going, wait, aren't like body language experts? Like if you're covering your face, it means you're, you're protecting yourself. And I was like, no, I must. I must have an open face. Me on dates. I have turrets. But I mean, yeah, one thing is that, like, you know, yeah, I've got more Tourette's on, like, the first date than I'm the other dates we're going to go on, which is so stupid. But I've also.

You're nervous on the date, on the first date. Yeah, yeah. You know, heightened the emotions generally for sure. Yeah. And then I also don't put that I have Tourette's in my, like, dating profile. files or whatever. But I do try to tell people before we meet up. But sometimes I forget, like, you know what I mean?

And I've gone on like more than when they were like, oh, shit, that's right. Because it's not, I don't consider it a core part of my personality. You know what I mean? It's not like, it's like a hat. Do you know what I mean? It's like I'm always wearing a hat. You can take a hat off. I know, I know.

But it's, yeah, I mean, it's, it's, but from like a, from, like a core personality type perspective thing. It's not what I'm thinking about. It's not what I'm like engaging with on a daily. I mean, when it happens, I engage with it. Um,

but in the same way you would like, tip a hat or adjust a hat. Um, so it does feel like I'm sort of just always wearing this like, you know, like a big silly hat or something. Yeah. That,

um, which is fine. And I like that. And I like the hat. Uh, when you're, when you start your act, you say like,

you just, You have one line about it just to, like, inform people that this is what the deal is. Yeah, I do. Yeah, I've got a few jokes. Torettes is sort of the abstract art of disabilities. A lot of people are like, I could do that. Yeah. But, but, you know what I mean?

If you were going stage in like a big, colorful hat or something and you just did your act, people would be like, oh, I thought you're going to talk about the hat and some, you know what I mean? So I do just do, oh, up top, I'm like, I do a few Trest's jokes. jokes, let them know that, like, you know, I'm aware and I'm comfortable. And then from that on, I just do my act. You know what I mean? Yeah. Like in, uh, in the hour, it's probably 95 to 90, probably 95% not Tourette's. Yeah.

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Buy or sell your next car today with Car Gurus at Car Gurus.com. The way your ticks like manifest when you're on stage is they sort of punctuate your jokes in a really nice way. It almost sounds like jazz drumming or something. I'm doing catch and release. I'm doing holding release. Tell me more. When I'm talking,

I can kind of try to hold it for, you know what I mean? And I'm a one-liner guy. So I'm doing like, you know, I'll talk, let it go, talk, let it go,

talk, let it go. Yeah. I think that the tension in my mind is building and like, semi-predictable, maybe even like a sine wave type way. And so we can get this sort of rhythm. Because I'm kind of going like, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-litt. Yeah, well, that's also the structure of comedy is like tension and release, right? And like the audience laughs.

And as the audience are laughing, you go, I don't want to do one of your takes of front of you. Do it. Okay. You go, huh, ha, ha, ha, or whatever. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. hike or whatever yeah

it like I riff on them too yeah you have a couple like uh bits of work you do off of yourself where like

you'll do a specific one and then have a line off of it I'm going like like I got like a I got like yeah and I go like oh spit on that thing

or whatever you know what I mean you say you're your own heckler yes yeah yeah and it kind of it was really depended on

like what turretsics I have You know what I mean? Yeah. And sometimes I'll do the, like, I've got the I'm my own heckler one. And sometimes I'll do that after like the wrong tick and it will land. If I go like, I'm my own heckler, doesn't make enough sense. Yeah.

If I go like, piece of shit. And I go, I'm my own heckler. Ah, yeah. That makes, you know what I'm a little bit more sense. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Piece of shit is that when you do that one, do you have any connection to a thought that you have about yourself? No.

You know what's funny? The New York one is my first context. Dependent. Really? Tech iPad. Yeah. All the other ones like, if I go shit or fuck or bitch or whatever, have been completely devoid of context.

If I go a piece of shit, it's like truly... That's really interesting. Yes. Because I have a thing where when I have a memory of something that I'm ashamed of or like a bit of social embarrassment. Yeah. I'll just go like, mother. like like I almost on involuntarily like if I'm thinking about a you know and it can be the smallest little social thing it's like oh I said I told the same story twice like that kind of thing but it's always like the same words stub your toe type thing yeah I do literally yeah it's like if you stub your toe you go like pizza shit fuck if you have like an embarrassing memory you might do that um I do think that Tourette's might literally be like without the stubbing your toe Ella.

moment. I'm going like, you know what I mean? I'm going. Yeah, you're having the physical reaction to a thought without the thought being present. Right. Yeah. Without the stumbling your toe sensation or whatever. Yeah. I think that just coming back to you doing it on stage, I think your approach is so great because it's like you go up. If the audience hasn't seen you before, you go up, you let them know the specific thing about you, which generates some interest. rest because for most people are like, oh, I haven't seen a comic with Reds before. I'm interested in, you have a couple jokes off of it.

But then you move off of it. You do the rest of your material. They're getting to know you. But then when you have a tick and do a joke off of it in the middle of the set, the feeling that I think the crowd gets is like, oh, man, this guy's so comfortable with who he is. Like, we're seeing this sort of vulnerable part of you, this thing that you have limited control over.

And you're working with it comedically in a way that's clearly so comfortable to you and it makes the audience go oh I could feel worried about this I could feel worried for him or sympathetic or something like that oh but instead I feel he feels comfortable I feel comfortable I've learned

something about a person it like really contributes nicely to getting like a full comedic meal from your act I appreciate that I'm straight up not vulnerable about it like I just like and I think that's part of the thing of like where people are like oh you're brave or whatever or, and I, I think people are assuming that there's some vulnerability,

but I truly don't care. And that's what I mean when I, that's what I'm trying to say when I don't care about it. And I got like I, like I do care in the sense of I would like to help normalize it, especially help, especially if there's kids with threats out there. I'd love for their peers to be able to see me being normal and chilling for them to see that and be like, oh, it's fine. But from myself, I'm not even remotely embarrassed by it. Because I know I have no control over it.

I know it's a physical disability thing. So I'm just like, all right. Yeah, I think that's wonderful to see. Yeah, I appreciate that a lot. Like social fear is one of the greatest fears that people have. you know, people are afraid of death and they're afraid of like physical violence and lack of safety. But like beyond that, most people's fear are social or of humiliation. Dude, my deepest fear is like alligator infested murky waters. And I'm so serious. That scares

the shit out of me. Like accidentally swimming in alligator waters. Oh my God. You know what I mean? But that's not happening on stage. Yeah. It's not really happening anywhere. Like accidentally swimming in alligator water. Dude, it happens sometimes. People do that shit. Yeah. Or you know what I mean? They don't know. They go south.

Has there been a situation in which you've like seen some water and you've been like, I almost got in the water? When I was younger, yeah. Like I think there was a formative memory of going to Florida when I was a kid and like thinking about going in the water. Yeah. And there was like literally a sign that was like don't go in there's alligator. So I mean there is honestly I truly think there might be like a formative memory there. Yeah.

So you're not going a lot of lakes. I mean, I love a lake but not at the not an alligator area. Well, I think that like to me. most people the idea of having the rest of the podcast is about the fear of alligators you're like get off of Tourette's yeah uh no no we'll move off of it but I think that like the the idea of doing something in a social context that is involuntary to most people is frightening you know it it like makes people feel vulnerable to imagine themselves being in that position right yeah they're projecting on

to me the fact that they can't fucking handle the heat. Well, to see you not be vulnerable about it, to see you be fearless about it is like a wonderful thing for people to see it. I appreciate that. And I think, well, I'll bring it back though, because I'm sure you've been told that you're brave as well simply for being on stage.

Right. Yes. Like that social fear doesn't just apply. Like, whatever the fear of performing and being on stage and doing stand up in front of a crowd and not knowing if it's going to go well or whatever, that having to deal with that same emotion is probably very, very similar to the social embarrassment that I'm feeling

with like Tourette's or whatever. Yeah. And so having done a lot of effort to quell that one, maybe earlier on I was more socially embarrassed with some of the stuff. But now it's gone pretty heavily. And like, so you can relate, right?

People tell you you're brave for doing stand-up and at this point you're like, no. Yeah, no. I just do it and like it feels bad or it feels good and then you do it the next night and it'll feel bad or good again and you know it's not going to kill you either way. But yeah, to someone who hasn't done it before, it's like very, the thought is very alarming. My favorite thing to say to people, because they're like, oh, I could never do stand up. And I always say to them, you should try.

Yeah, it's like you, yeah, you'll find out. Go to an open mic. Give it a, give it a shot. You do it twice or three times and you'll learn more about it than you could ever imagine and you'll have done it. And you'll see what it's like. I think it's like, and people go, I could know, I could never. You know, it's like, I think it's like driving on the highway. Yeah. You know what I mean? First time you're driving on the highway, you're like, oh my God. And then like, maybe like, me years to get over that. Yeah. Yeah. Right. And then at a certain point,

you're like, you're like, you're zoning out. You know what I mean? Now you're going like 70 and you're like, holy shit, I've been driving. Yeah. But that's wrong. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, yeah. You shouldn't zone out. That's valid. By the way, I don't really, people always ask about driving with the Tourette's. Yeah. I don't really know. I don't really drive that much anymore. I've been driven since, uh, since prior to it getting severe, I haven't really driven.

Wow, really? Well, I just, I drove in high school a little bit, uh, like bar my parents' car, but, um, since then I've lived in Philadelphia and then I lived in New York and they both had. Do you feel like it would interfere with, uh, driving? Uh, potentially. I could see, um, I don't know. Um, I can imagine if you had anything with your leg for a, in, it, and, that might be. Yeah. I have done it. I did it one time because I drove to a gig. No, sorry,

my friend drove us to a gig. Then he drank four beers and I was like, all right, well, I'm driving us back. Yeah. So I did drive us back then and I was able to kind of lock in, but I definitely, I remember multiple times kind of like, it's like, you know, when you sneeze or when you're driving, it's like that. Yeah. You know what I mean? But a lot more often. Often. A lot more often. Yeah. And you kind of have to go, all right. Yeah, I don't like sneezing while driving for that reason. You're like, oh, you know, trying to stay stable while your body is going through an involuntary convulsion. Yes. Yeah. But because I can redirect it, I'm like holding my legs still. Yeah. And maybe I'm like, I'll take my hand off. I remember, I don't know. But that's what I would probably do. I don't know that. I don't do it that often to know. Okay. So I want to talk about comedy. you and I were on a show in Brooklyn we both did sets afterwards a woman who worked for NPR

came up to us You remember this? Yeah, of course. And she said, I'm recording a show, I believe it was for the show, Science Verses, and it was about jokes.

And she was like, can I interview you guys about how jokes work? Yeah. And I told her. And we sat there and we told her, and I told her my little theory about, you know,

what makes something funny, which is that it's a combination of truth and surprise or something expected and something unexpected you know like of course that would happen but I didn't expect it to happen or oh that's so true

but I never thought of that before like that's that to me it doesn't apply in all cases but I think it's like good enough to tell a reporter lady yeah and you said to her I'm not going to answer your question

because I know I know the structure of comedy and if I tell you you're going to steal it or something like that Not quite. I, um, no, I, you, you had such a firm theory that you did not want to share. No, I actually told her.

You did tell her. I just outright told her. I, uh, okay, um, a little bit of a reveal. I haven't really been public about this, but I, well, people know I teach, I teach like a joke writing. Yeah. It's kind of like, but it's really a comedy theory class. Um, and okay, the thing is that whenever anybody talks about comedy theory, it's annoying. and they kind of are like wearing this hat of like

I think of everything in terms of wearing a hat by the way but it's like a little bit like you know it's very pretentious it can be very wishy-washy very pseudoscience type stuff yeah sure but okay a little bit of a reveal a little bit of a top secret reveal that I'm going to do for you now great I've spent like the entire time I've been working on comedy I spent like a like a decade working on like comedy theory

and I've got like I've got like a very in-depth, like, visual modeling system for, like, metaphors and for, like, hyperbole and stuff based on, like, subjective concept, structure diagram type stuff. Yeah. And, you know, and it lets me read poop jokes. But that's irrelevant element of it. Like, there's the two sides. There's structure, which is like, is it a hyperbole, is a metaphor? And then there's the aesthetic side, which is going to be things like, what's it about?

one of the flavors of the idea. Whoop has a flavor. No good. But, you know, ladybugs, butterflies, sex, drugs,

rock and roll, all have different subjective aesthetic flavors that you can tap into for jokes and whatnot. And then the subtext as well, which is like, and that's,

by the way, the subtext is part of why I find it hard. It's ironic because I have a hard time talking about this because the subtext with a lot of jokes

It's like, you want to be low status. You want to be like, you want to, I think it's better to be stupid. Yeah. Kind of play the fool. But inherently talking about comedy theory is sort of this like, like smart kind of looking thing to do. So it can be kind of annoying. So I know that there's a little bit of that issue with it. But, uh, yeah, like, you know, in the context as well, like, who what, where, when, why.

I find it fascinating that you, that you think about comedy that way because, look, I believe comedy has structure. You can break down the structure if you want. I have my own little theories like I said that if someone asked me, I have an answer. You know, I've taught comedy writing before at UCB. Certainly, I believe that comedy is something you can teach. But my experience is that most people who are doing comedy professionally, like, don't really think about that much day to day. Like at UCB, me or other comedy writers could like teach you, okay, literally here's a handout of, you know, here's how sketch comedy works. But like,

when I'm writing myself, I'm not like, okay, what's the game of the scene or like, what's the, you know, et cetera. I'm just kind of doing it by feel. And the structure, I just sort of internalized and it supports it. Tell me a joke. I'll try to tell you the structure. I'm serious.

Well, let me finish. I think that, I think it's interesting that as you have become a professional comedian, you have built more structure for yourself. and you seem to be actively using it in your work, your specific analysis, which I think is pretty rare among practicing comics. I appreciate that.

I got to say, I didn't mean to do this reveal until I don't mind. I don't mind. Well, the plan was to put out... You think it's going to make news? You think it's going to hit the papers? No, not... Well, I wanted to put out the special first. And then

I do believe that the proof isn't doing it. And, you know, people are like, oh, I've got a comedy theory. And then they're like dog shit at comedy and so it's like well you obviously like I think like if I were to put out an hour of jokes yeah and people like it enough that I can go the plan is to go and here's how I did that here's my mechanism yeah they don't want to kind of have it be a mystifying thing I want to be like here's the here's my recipes here I don't think you're revealing it right now I think you're teasing it because you're still going to do that yeah yeah yeah because you could not

possibly explain all of it I mean we could have you back after you reveal it and you go walk us through your whole structure. It takes about five hours. I know from doing the class. It takes five hours to explain your comedy? Most of it. Maybe seven if I went to a little more detail. And so do you use this actively when you write?

Do you go through and you're like, you're using your flow charts and your diagrams? Yeah, definitely. Wow. Yeah, yeah. It's not really, yeah, it's not really flow charts. But yeah, totally. That's, and that has helped you write more.

Tell me a joke. Tell you a joke. Okay. this is my this is my joke I always tell when people ask me to tell them a joke it's not from my act or anything but I do like this joke

oh fuck I always forget it though you remember the name of the actress she just she just stabbed herself it was like in the new her name's Reese Reese with right okay

Reese can I pause you and go I know what you're going to say yeah you've heard the joke before well maybe I've heard it before but also it yeah okay what am I going to

gonna say uh i'm gonna go i go with her spoon and then you go with her knife yeah exactly with her knife yeah yeah yeah i like that joke because it's so stupid somebody did that joke to me 15 years ago and it's fun to do right it's fun to get the other person to say witherspoon of course of course yeah totally you didn't you didn't let me make you do no i'm sorry i'm sorry i did fuck it up no i was trying to i was wearing this i was trying to wear the hat of no well no i mean your your comedy theory is so comprehensive that no no everybody watching you were like watching can see that you saw No, no, no, no.

Look, I don't think it's a brilliant joke, that's just the one that I do. So, well, yeah, tell me, do you have analysis of this joke? Nope. No, yeah, of course. Yeah, I mean, okay, so, wow, yeah, it would take a minute to explain. But basically, it's just like,

I mean, it is just like a classic mystery egg. And like a mystery egg, okay, damn, okay, there was a lot more context that I have to explain. Okay, well, first, let's start with context. First of all, this requires you to be like, now in the last, like, somewhat amount of time in America in order to get the reference of who Reese Witherspoon. Right, yes.

Who, by the way, I don't entirely know who that is. I just know the name. Wow. All right. I'm not really a movie guy. I don't know if she's a TV or movie person. She's everything, man. I mean, she's a mogul.

Sorry, Reese. But I know the name. And it's like, you know, like, you know, like. that joke wouldn't work 50 years ago or in China. Yeah. Or something. You know what I mean? Yes.

And so first there's this sort of like local American context, uh, and or at least anglosphere. Um, and then, uh, yeah, the English speaking. Um, and then we've got, uh, yeah, Reese Witherspoon. You're setting it up as if you don't know. You're kind of doing a dramatic irony thing. Uh, you try to play it for real. Uh, I, you know, I mean, just like, uh,

we go with a spoon and then the swap you're doing is a little bit of linguistic but also in the category of okay so a swap is a type of thing that you can do you know what i'm gonna pause yeah and go a little further out sure uh go ahead okay the thing with structure mm-hmm the way it goes is that we've got ideas we've got all sorts of concepts in our mind yes we've got things like spoons we've got things like dogs or whatever. But those are all related to each other in different hierarchies of meaning. So spoons, forks, knives

are all in the category of utensil. But they could also be considered in like the subcategory of like Western. And then chopsticks are also in the category of utensil. In that same way, you can imagine a sort of hierarchy tree of meaning. Yes. At the bottom of that is going to be like our senses

and everything is built up from sense information. And so what you're doing there. is a, well, okay, so what we can do to information is we can change it so we can add things together. We can remove things. We can swap things around. Or we can rearrange it. We can create pattern structures. We can compare things. That doesn't necessarily change them. If I say A is like B, but it's a way of comparing things. And then what we're trying to do is we create different resolutions with it. We're trying to create

incongruity or pseudo equivalence or like Mr. X are a certain type of increduity in a way that has I guess a surprise element. And so with this one, we've got Reese, the name Witherspoon.

You're dividing the word witherspoon linguistically into spoon and wither. And also, this is idea with her spoon. And spoon, you're swapping in the category of utensil to a knife

and that becomes how she stabbed it. You know what I mean? It's like, I'm, there's creating a link between, I don't know what I'm saying I am. I didn't rate this joke. Right, right, right, right, right.

But we're changing the, just sort of like homophonic, whatever, the sound of the word into its component meaning, which is a fun little transformation. Absolutely, yeah, yeah. I'm also forcing the other person to participate in the joke That's true

Is part of what is funny to me about it Absolutely And then the last thing that's funny to me about Because I do like the joke Yeah But the reason I like it is because it's so fucking stupid It's really dumb Yeah

And it sort of lets people down When it happens And it's Yeah, it's So there's a bit of like meta-comedy for me in it In that Meta- By the way, if we're playing with patterns and stuff If I go like, A, B, C, Q, that's a pattern misdirect.

Metacomody is pattern misdirects with common patterns of jokes and expectations of jokes. So anti-jokes, you know, if you tell a joke and it doesn't have a punchline, that is itself the misdirect. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. Which, by the way, whenever we get to this point, I have to point this out, that what you're talking about is. why did the chicken cross the road to get to the other side, right? Something like that, yeah. And what I find fascinating about that joke is that's the first joke that almost every child

learns, at least that was the first joke I ever learned. I remember saying that to other people. And yet, that joke is premised on there being a whole category of joke that no longer exists where, like, I'm a child, I'm saying, why the chicken crossed the road to get to the other side. I have never heard a joke that is in the pattern that I'm breaking, right? why did the chicken cross the road and then there's an actual punchline it's anti-comedy and it's the first joke you ever learn i find that really fascinating i i don't think it's possible for that

to be for like you would have to have heard other jokes don't it on to get no i think that's the really i as a kid that was the first joke i ever learned um but i think that when you're that young you don't understand why jokes are funny you're just sort of more repeating things that you hear oh interesting you know okay um but it's like this very I think if you were doing a family feud style and you asked like a million Americans to name one joke as quickly as possible they would give that line

Oh sure And I think that's fascinating Because it is itself an anti-jerk Yeah And I know just to come back to the Reese Witherspin thing over quick And just go like You can see that

That joke had a lot of layers to it Like I was I was trying to hit on like The different parts of it But like there's a lot of parts to that joke and it's like it's a whole fucking thing and it you know what I mean I think that's why I honestly think that's why people um haven't really dug into it yet it's because like there's that famous thing of like uh people in a dark room feeling an elephant and they're like yeah oh jokes are

sharp and pointy oh jokes are a long chunk or whatever you know what I mean yeah um yeah there's a number of different theories about jokes all of which I read a couple of different like philosophical books about jokes by, you know, philosophers of language and stuff. And they'll have a theory and you'll go, oh, yeah, that applies to some jokes. And then someone also have a completely different theory that has,

you know, there's like the benign violation theory, which is a theory entirely about like that jokes are, are social violations of social rules and benign context. Yeah. And like, that's true of some jokes, but not most or certainly not all.

That's the one I'm thinking of when I talk about people who had a theory, but then like didn't actually do comedy or like, we're bad at it. They like said they tried to do it like ride they tried to they like they themselves are like we then tried to write jokes about this and then it wasn't working and I'm like well yeah. Yeah that it's like that's that's an extremely specific subset of like aesthetics of like you know what I mean. Yeah no it's philosophers who are studying aesthetics and trying to understand humor and yeah they're these philosophers that did that and then tried to go do stand up and couldn't make people laugh despite having a theory of humor.

that they were trying to prove out. Yeah. So, so I'm more than happy to say like, uh, listen, I'm not fucking done with it yet. But, but I, but I, I'm still cooking it. Um, yeah. I mean, it's, I've been working on it for like literally a decade. Yeah. Um, but as I've got, as I've learned more with that, um, and incorporated as much of I can, uh, I've gotten hopefully better at the act or whatever as well, you know, and like I can, you know, yeah, I think that's what I find interesting about this is that most people who have theories of comedy

are not funny or are often not even trying to be funny. And most people who are funny don't have a theory of comedy. Like most comedians they'll just like will say shit like oh funny is funny. You know, uh, jokes or jokes, whatever. Either you're funny or you're not. Like stuff that is like anti

even the idea of trying to understand comedy. Right. They just sort of do it. And you're like perhaps the only comic or working comedy writer I know who like systematizes it that way apart from you know maybe like improv teachers and that that sort of person. I bet you there's people who are also doing it but are guarding it more closely or you know what I mean. But I also think like it's like music theory and I think

I do think there's probably people who get really into the music theory weeds and that are like doing like weird experimental stuff that only they and they're like students like or something. Of course. But then there's people who don't know a damn thing about it and then make like the most popular pop song of all time or something. Yeah. And, you know, I'm just trying to be in the middle. I'm trying to, you know what I mean? I like to be like primus or whatever where it's like, the music is good and also I respect

what they're doing. Yeah, but music has like specific, at least Western music has specific like math about it, right? Right. Like you can go through and like, okay, the scales are like the notes are this far apart and like, you know, it has like all this specific structure in it. And, like, comedy doesn't fundamentally have that. I think it could. You think it could.

That's my, that's my, yeah, I don't know. But the more I talk about this, I feel a little bit like, we'll move off of it. I just, I guess I, like, like, it really does feel like, nobody agrees with me at all or wants to hear my thoughts on this until I think they already like my comedy. This is why we put some of your jokes at the top of the podcast. Okay, I appreciate that, but I am truly like, like, oh, man, I don't know.

It's like, uh, yeah, I don't know. Yeah, that's part, that's going to be act two of my career. How do you feel about, um, I feel like something that people say about one-liner comics like you is they always do the Mitch Headberg comparison. They always say, oh, like Mitch Headberg. I'm just curious what you think about that. I love Mitch Hedberg. Yeah. Uh, one of my favorites.

Um, however, I get that comment truly every day of my life. Yeah. Uh, to the point that it is just a wash. Yeah. I mean. It's like the Tourette's right. It's another hat I'm wearing. You know what I'm in. Another hat in your hat based economy. I like I really do love him. But my relationship to him has become very numbing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But there's the he's become such a I mean, he was like literally I think one of the first stand of comics I ever fell in love with like strategic grill locations like hit my college campus. I mean, Dane Cook really hit for a lot of people at that time. You see his news special in his house? No, I didn't. He got drone footage of, like, his house.

And, like, it's like people in his beanbag chairs, like, in his, like, pool area. He shot it at his own house? Like, with an audience in his own backyard? Yeah. Wow. That's, you know what? I'm not going to judge that until I see it. I'm kind of curious.

Just watch it on mute. Sorry. Sorry. Well, like, there's a certain. Um, there, you know, there's a certain. sort of like whimsy that Mitch had a certain kind of free associational thinking that was like really its own sort of strain in comedy that for a lot of people just became like how they describe a huge amount of comedy. You just don't, you just don't relate to it at all.

I don't, don't relate to the what? To the description. Like, I don't know. To Mitch Hepberg? No, no, no. I really, I really do relate to it. I really appreciated a lot, a lot. A lot love him. I'm certainly doing one-liners. I'm certain doing whimsical. Like I know I'm in that tradition. I know I'm yeah. But I guess okay similar to the comedy stuff it's annoying of me to go

yeah I'm the new Mitch Hedberg guy. Right. But I am sort of getting it constantly ascribed to me in this way that it's hard that my relationship to is people call me Twitch Headberg or stuff you know what I mean? That's that's insulting to everybody. I don't mind that actually. But yeah

Okay. But no, no, no, I, I love him. I am trying to do a little bit of a, I mean, I got to do my own lane, of course. Yeah. And so it's, you know, of course, like Stephen Wright. Stephen Wright and Mitch Hebburg were both doing kind of on stage of being like more spacey or more, like, a more unique or cockyed delivery or something. Yeah. And I think that if I was doing that, it would seem like I was trying to straight up, like, copy them.

Yeah. So I try to just be straightforward and kind of just be, or so you know what I mean, be myself and just do my own jokes because the jokes themselves are what's the new different content. Yeah. That's how I try to differentiate, you know. Yeah. I mean, one thing I do think is similar between you and him is a couple years ago, I was trying to like re-inspire myself about stand-up and I went back and listened to strategic girl locations. And it's actually a really interesting album because it's like one take in a sort of noisy kind of nightclub environment. And he's like so present in the room.

You know, there's a bass player who he's talking to. Oh, yeah. Let me be clear. I love them to death. I know. I know you do. I know you do. Oh, yeah.

Yeah. But he, but, you know, uh, I think a lot of one-liner comics tend to get really detached from their environment because they're just like delivering the joke, right? Right. Um, and he's super, super present in the room. He's like reacting to things that are happening. and you really feel like you're there with him. And I get the same sense when I'm watching you

that you have your jokes, but you're also like responding to your tics, you're responding to the audience. I learned that from him. Yeah. You know what I mean? I like, I literally,

um, it's actually funny. I was doing one liners before I really got into Mitch Hebrick, which I don't know how the fuck that happened. Um, but like just like early on I, well, I actually do know how it happened.

I saw a joke from Sarah Silverman that was kind of like a one liner and I was like, well, I like just like one line jokes and I, yeah, they're doing that. And then people are like, oh, and I fell in love with this stuff

but I didn't know what to do in a joke bomb and I just was like being weird about it on stage you know what I mean I was like all right you know because it's doing one liner is in a joke bombs

it's like yeah you swung and you missed and everybody saw it yeah and getting to hear Mitch headburn yeah nothing to fall back on yeah nothing to fall back on

and seeing hearing how Mitch Hedberg would just seeing like YouTube videos or something where it was like a different show like maybe not one of the main albums or something

And he just get, like, as big of a laugh on a joke and how he would just keep cooking or maybe, yeah, he'd be like, that one, we're going to add laughs in on the album. You know what I mean? Yeah. I was like, oh, you just own it and keep going. And so, yeah, like, I've certainly learned a lot from these guys. Yeah.

You know what I mean? You, uh, another thing I admire about you as a guy in your spot in the industry. Thanks, man. This is a very flattering podcast. I appreciate this a lot. I wouldn't have you on if I didn't, if I didn't think you were Great. And if I didn't think you were interesting. I love what you're doing as well. You're an important voice in these times and there's a lot of evil folks in comedy and you're part of the alliance that we're forging.

We're forging an alliance of non-evil comics. Of centrist. What's on the other side? If there's like the if there's like the edge lord fuckos and we're centrist according to you, who's on the other side? A great question. Oh, just the really the really cuddly comics. Really sweetie pies. Yeah.

No, you post a lot of stuff that's like pretty confrontational about, like, you know, what other comics are doing like shit that is, you know, reinforcing shitty stereotypes or is, you know, retrograde in various ways. And a lot of a lot of comics, especially comics like in New York don't do that because they don't want to start shit and they don't want people to be pissed at them. Well, New York's got the club scene and also the alt scene.

And if you do both, if you talk shit about like the Keltony type folks or whatever, or, I don't know, that whole sphere, you will also possibly bump into people adjacent to that world and crowd. Yeah. So it becomes a drama in that way. But I really don't do the clubs as much. But also, I got to that perspective from really, you know, not to do it, not to bring it back up, but the joke theory stuff is, you know, studying. irony, truly looking at irony, be like, all right, how's this work? And then I see these guys doing regressive material and going like, oh, it's just a joke, dude. And I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Brother, what you said was racist. You know what I mean? And then like, and they're trying to hide behind

this. Like, it's just a joke defense. Yeah. And I've like, you know, and I, um, and just like, you know, being a little, uh, weirdo in my room and trying to scribble down. how irony works for years and I'm like, I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. When you, when you're, when you're, when you're do a racist joke, yeah, it can be anti-racist if you're doing an ironic thing from the correct perspective, making fun of, like if you're doing an ironic caricature of a racist, yeah, it can be anti-racist. If you're not doing an ironic caricature of a racist, then you're being

racist, you know what I mean? And, but also you can use irony to be racist as well. you could be a racist guy doing an ironic caricature of like a dumb black guy or something and like that was the root of like minstrel shows. And so it's like, you know, comedy is not inherently a tool

or good. Yeah. Just because it makes people laugh. It's an idea puzzle framework and you can use it to reinforce or to say whatever sort of ideas you want to say. Yeah.

And so these guys use it to say shit like we should deport all illegals or not the use of the not the use of their framing or that trans people are deceiving others or that that's like an underlying framework of a lot of you know anti-trans jokes no sorry no no but exactly

and that's an ironic thing right I'm I by saying that in that moment just now was playing the ironic character of one of those guys who believes that that stuff is true and you know comedy is playing with a lot of like logic and stuff of like You know, the incongruity, what's true, what's false. Yeah.

And because culture is subjective these days and people believe different things, I mean, people always believe in things, their reality and their understanding of what is true. And the people talk about how comedy is rooted in truth. It's like, it absolutely is. It's rooted in like true and false. And what the idea is that they are reinforcing us true are different stereotypes or whatever. Yeah. And we're like, and then we on the left go, well, that's actually.

We don't agree with that. We don't, that's not our foundation of truth. Yeah. Idea structures. You know what I mean? Yeah. I mean,

you see people do jokes sometimes where like the entire comp, I mean, let's do a famous example. Tony Hinchcliff at that big Madison Square Garden rally for Trump, right? Where he did the joke about Puerto Rico. And he also did a joke where he pointed at a black guy and he said something like, I was at that guy's house eating watermelon, right? And that was like a joke. And I was like, well, first of all, you didn't write that joke because that's like a hundred years.

Just a stereotype. Just a hundred years old, right? It's like, where's the joke? But second of all, what is it just based on this belief that the public has that black people, in fact, do enjoy eating water? Which is a racist stereotype. There's no, there's no irony. What is, all it does is reinforce the truth value of the original stereotype. Right, right.

And we can do different checks to find out if somebody's doing irony. Does the idea contradict itself? Does it contradict your reputation? Does it contradict like the context? I'll give a quick example of you if you're interested. Yeah. So I've got a joke where I go, I'm at the aquarium petting zone just grabbing. And like that idea, in order to know about that, you have to be aware that you're not

supposed to grab at the aquarium. So there's inherently a logical transgression. If you think I mean that for real, you have to think that I deliberately want to harm the animals. So that joke just has a clear, obvious logical error to itself. Reputation is something like if two people say, I love flying in my private jet, if one of them is a tech billionaire, that's not ironic, doesn't contradict the reputation. If one of them is Greta Thunberg, that contradicts her reputation.

And we would know she was getting from like a class. Yeah. And also your aquarium joke works that way too because you're doing such other sweet jokes about animals. Right. People are like, this guy, I can tell this guy doesn't want to hurt animals. That's true. But I also think that you don't necessarily, that reputational check, like the average person doesn't want to hurt animals. So you wouldn't have to do too deep of an average reputation check there.

Oh, I hope. You know what this really illuminates for me? It's saying I think about a lot was there were a lot of alt comics in the mid-2000s who were doing ironic racist jokes. like Sarah Silverman famously did tons of those jokes and like you know had a whole debate with like the Asian Anti-Defamation League and stuff like that and in retrospect when I go back and look at those jokes I'm like oof those don't read to me as ironic at all and the reason is back then in like 2006 the sort of assumption was on the part of white comedians well none of us are racist because we all know racism is bad right therefore if I do racist jokes it's clear that it's ironic right 20 years later I have a more nuanced view of racism and how it works in America and like that was

those jokes were premised on the idea that we had reached some kind of post racial moment in America where like racism isn't really real so we can just do it ironically because it's kind of like from the past it's like a dated thing and I don't feel that way about racism in America anymore so especially not said by white people

and therefore those jokes don't read to me that way I wouldn't yeah I wouldn't fault yeah I wouldn't fault those comedians for that necessarily because their intentions were good. But, well, I know she got flak for actually saying the slur for one of them. And I think that that is a little bit of a different thing where even if you have good intentions, there's certain things that the doing it itself is the flaw, like saying certain slurs or like, yeah, I can't ironically do blackface to make fun of people who do blackface.

Yeah. That simply is itself the flaw. Yeah. But a trans person could certainly make an ironically, could certainly do a transphobic joke. And it would be very clear that they were being ironic from a reputational perspective. Yeah, totally. But also the reason those comics were able to do that in the 2000s was because the voices of the people who are going, hey, this joke actually doesn't fucking make sense. It's not ironic to me.

It just sounds like a racist joke. Those people didn't have voices in the media at the time. They weren't able to get that message out, right? Right. And so, like, the sort of, like, white media establishment was like, oh, yeah, that's a funny, you know, ironically racist joke, whereas the people who are going, no, no, no, no, that actually, to me is racist. So the context, like, changed around us, you know. Of course, yeah. Or the context of what we, you know, understand culturally as a whole.

But the, it's like the, the reputational irony is very different now, you know. how I view that sort of comic when they're speaking. Yeah, and that comes back to those guys where it's like they'll make a transphobic joke or a xenophobic joke and then have Trump or J.D. Vance on their podcast or something who are enacting the actual political project of transphobic laws or deporting people or whatever. And so your reputation now becomes aligned with the actual far-right conservatism of those ideas. So we know it doesn't contradict that context. We know it doesn't contradict your reputation. I mean, those jokes are not even, look, if you want to go back to Sarah Silverbren, or those sort of jokes and say, oh, those, you know, ironic racism, you know, it was an attempt

to be anti-racist that, you know, maybe by today's standards failed or whatever. But when you talk about comics who are doing anti-trans jokes today, they're just anti-trans jokes. They're just premised on trans people are bad or evil or liars or fake or that sort of thing. There isn't, a lot of demons. Yeah, there isn't the thing of, oh, I know I'm not supposed to say this. That's what makes it funny. They're like, no, I am supposed to say it. It's what I believe.

Like, that's been a real shift in comedy over the past couple of years. Yeah, I think those guys are interesting because I actually find them to be weirdly progressive about disability. And I'm actually so serious about that. Interesting. And I've been trying to, okay, I'm in my new era of love and light. and I believe that actions and ideas can be harmful or evil or whatever, but I've been trying to view individuals as having just incorrect ideas or incorrect framing or whatnot. And so I think a lot of those guys, like, are more originally at least coming from the perspective of, you know, trying to be free speech guys or whatever.

And then you can see that they mean well in the space of like Gaza. they're like they're like they'll be like free Palestine they're like accurately calling that out um or they'll be like really pro disability or something um and but then like when it comes to like gender and stuff like that they're like so bad uh but a lot of that is like this ego thing of like um you can tell that they were like I don't know you can tell that they have been scorned or like like um I don't know like it just it just it It feels like there's like some sort of Freudian psychological thing going on with some of those guys where like they like they just don't want to be called gay or whatever. So they have to like perform this machismo.

Yeah. It's a very like boys club, but they'll let certain token people in if they are willing to bash in the same way. Yeah. A certain what is it like queerness like threatens their their own sense of self in some way like the. Yeah, I'm armchair psychoanalyzing the entire Austin. scene. But I'm trying to do that out of an empathetic angle where I'm trying to be like, I don't want to like, I don't want to think of Tony Hinchcliff as like evil because I think that makes him

fundamentally like, that makes it not a solvable situation. It makes, you know what I mean? But I had been thinking that way. Yeah. And I'm trying to be like, okay, well, how do we, how do we more empathetically go like, hey guys, knock it off, please? You know what I mean? Well, you don't, you don't say.

that to those guys. You're not in community with them. Why would they listen to you? You know? Right. Should I be in community with them? I mean, I should go and kill Tony. There are people, there are people who are. There's a people, a couple of degrees separation from us who are. But like, you know, what I guess those people decide what's their responsibility to do, you know? Do you think, what are your thoughts on evil?

Do you know what I mean? It's hard to, like, it's a, we're at a crossroads. If like, are these people doing evil or, you know, okay, I'll give you my, um, overall view of human morality since you gave me your overall view or a tease of your overall view of comedy. I believe that every good thing and every bad

thing that has ever happened on earth has been because of people and that humanity has within it the capacity for if you want to call it good or evil or pro-social or or productive or destructive or we have all those things within us as a species in equal measure or maybe hopefully 51% on the good side, you know, but they're there

there, right? And, uh, you know, we, we, I think often allow ourselves this fantasy, especially in America of like that, that perspective from the mid 2000s of, oh, racism is over. Like, oh, it doesn't exist any. Oh, that's from the past. That's like old timey stuff. Right. That's like an old guy in a, you know, one piece swimsuit lifting a barbell. That's like a silly thing from the past, you know? Like, no, it's still around. It's still, racism is with, lurks within the human heart. Hatred lurks within the human heart. Like, it's part of humanity and it's part of all of us to some degree. And our job as a species is to, if we just let people, like, wander the earth and like do what they do, they're going to hurt each other, you know,

because that, that lurks within all of us. Um, but if we build systems that sort of push people away from hurting and towards helping, right, then we increase the amount of good in the world, right? And so those systems might be, you know, culture, like, like building a culture that is more productive and pro-social and, like, empathetic. It might be putting laws in place that prevent people from acting in bad ways or, you know, so how would one do so in the entertainment industry? Yeah, I know. But so when it comes to those individual people, that's what you're asking. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think you can, I think you have to look at some people and go like, that person's got a hate in his heart, you know?

And it's not like, is it his fault? I don't know if fault comes into it, but like, yeah, those people exist in the world and you do need to be able to label them as such, you know? And so sometimes as I see comics on stage and I'm like, yeah, this joke is about you hate those people. You hate the people that you're, this joke is rooted in hate. And like, I can tell that from looking at you from the way that you speak, from the things that you choose to say, you know, to a certain extent when you go on stage, you're

exposed to the audience. You can write all the jokes you want. You can like, you know, rehearse your act. But the audience can see you and see the way that you carry yourself and like what you choose to speak about, you know? And yeah, it's just like you can

tell. Totally. Yes. And then it comes back to this thing of... You want to come back to evil. Well, but I mean, I guess but it totally, I see what you're saying. And it's important to label them in this way. Let's say these guys are doing harm. right. They are promoting

Trump and Vance and they're promoting these negative ideas that lead to material harm for people through either personal violence done by individuals who agree with them or systemic like changes of laws, etc.

And it's important to change them doing that. We don't want those guys to be continue to say what they're doing. But what we've tried has been canceling. them right and what we tried has been going like stop uh knock it off don't say that that's you're being racist yeah and that hasn't worked um they have just gotten more popular uh you see what

saying and if anything it's uh we're kind of throwing fuel on the fire and so now that's why i'm trying to be like okay that seems to have been the wrong approach um and it comes like if we look at something like, like RFK, for example, it's hard, like, doesn't necessarily have hate in his heart, but he thinks that vaccines cause autism. Also, by the way, this is, your video is not going to have the Wikipedia thing. Um, but, um, thank you for making that happen for me. I've been trying to get that for years. You're welcome. Uh, and the, the, the question is like, well, how do you change somebody's mind? Like, like, like, it's like, um, you can't, um, you can't just call, like, if we just say

to RFK, you're a moron, you're wrong, you're an idiot, this is incorrect, that doesn't work. That doesn't that doesn't fire him from the CDC board. So, like, now we're in this position of like, how do we get these

Austin comics to truly realize that their words have implications and material damage? In the same way that, like, how do you convince somebody like RFK that, you know what I mean? Yeah, I mean, first of all, I don't know that we get them to do anything. Like, like, I think one problem we have in comedy is that we unfortunately, I think,

sometimes see it as almost too big of a tent. Like, I think some of those, we might be better off if some of those people, we were like, they're in a different line of work. You know what I mean? Like, we're not literally doing the same job. Oh, interesting. You know, we're appealing to different audiences. We're trying to do different things, you know.

I think there's a, you know, when comedy was smaller, it was sort of like, we're all in this together, you know, and there's like a little bit of bonds of camaraderie. But like, I don't, I think maybe we can let that go about some of these. You know, there are,

there are literally, like, there are literally comics who are making their careers on, you know, racism, transphobia. Like, that's,

they are appealing to racist audiences. You know, that's what they're doing. And I don't think it's within my power or is it my responsibility. to, like, control what they do one way or another, you know? I think I can label it as such and not allow it to pass by unremarked upon or, or, you know, look the other way or whatever.

I can go like, yeah, that's fucking racist, you know. But I don't think I should try to convince them one way or another. I do think it's my responsibility to try to create a more equitable society that I would like to see using my comedy to do so, you know, but I'm not trying to control what other people do. Well, you know, I don't want to, I don't want to control them. Yeah. But I would like to persuade them. Yeah.

I would like to have a nice solid cube of rhetoric that they can go, ooh. You know what I mean? It's like, you know, back in the day, different civil rights people have been like, we need to convince the general public that X, Y, the opinion structure is bad. You know, I mean, people used to be like against interracial marriage. And, like, people literally had to be like, no, here's why. There are people who are still against interracial. Yeah, that's crazy.

That's nuts. Yeah. Some of them are probably doing jokes about it. True, true, true. Like, you know, maybe it's, okay, maybe this is a bit of a thing. You labeling them as such can be seen by your audience. And so it's like if we have the general public and they are listening to messages both from you and from Kiltoni and they're seeing the general media landscape.

It's like injecting certain rhetoric or injecting, like, certain ideas into that space can help people go, oh, that guy over there's being racist. Like, I guess that is that labeling and demonstrating why. I mean, yeah, you can argue whether or not, like, for the general public who's like, what kind of comedy should I listen to? You know, like this show or that show. And if I'm out there going, that show's racist, they might go, that guy's, that guy who's calling him racist is a little being a little rude. maybe maybe they're the people over there having more fun that's a that's a fair argument when you're talking about like getting to you know then you're focusing on the audience well that I meant it more of like the um not that calling them racist is a bad thing I meant like no it's good we want to call them

racist so that the audience sees that they're racist yeah like that's why I'm like the whole thing with people are like oh it's just a joke and I think a lot of people believed that and that's why I've been trying to really hammer home that whole point of, like, irony and be like, no, here's how this works so that people can talk to their coworker or their dad or their brother or their partner or whatever. Like, you know what I mean? Like, they'll watch my video. They'll hopefully get the ideas better understand. Yeah. Like, I think a lot of people know that those guys are being shitty, but they can't exactly articulate why or put their finger on it. Yeah. But I think you and I can. Yes. And I think we saying why helps them say.

why and it does have impact in the culture and i agree with you about like canceling is is meaningless as a term now you know but um what what i agree with you about is there was this effort for a little while to try to like expel people from comedy period right to uh to go like oh and it came out of this time when people used to say there was no such thing as conservative comedy. This was like in the end of the Obama era. People were like, oh, conservative comedy doesn't even exist. Literally, I heard people say this on podcast and stuff. And no one would say that today. Right. But when that sort of comedy started appearing, the two things that happened were the comics would be like, it's just a joke. It's not really conservative. It's not really

racist. It's not really right wing. It's not really whatever it is. And then the people who were opposed to it would go, what that that shouldn't be allowed. Like we said that that doesn't exist. Why are they allowed to do it, you know? And I think both perspectives are wrong. You should go, no, it is racist or it is right wing, two different things. And also, of course they can do it because there's racists and there's right wingers who want to laugh. And like, these people are going to go to them. Right. There's going to be podcasts for them. There's people are going to buy tickets to the comedy club. Yeah. And like, so you can't like, you, A, you can't ignore it. You also can't wish it away. Right. You have to like accept it and actually grab.

with it in a in a real way and then you know say what it is and provide an alternative that makes more sense and you know build systems that hopefully you know hold up stuff that you like and and you know not things that you don't like absolutely yeah I mean people should be allowed to read mind comp but I should be allowed to go like hey those ideas are incorrect just a heads up you know what I mean like I like I like I don't want to censor these guys yeah you should be allowed to say a racist joke. Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah. You should also be able to call it out and go, that joke's fucking racist, man. Of course. Of course. Yeah. Yeah. But I just wish that more

people knew. I think, I truly think that people are like, they don't think it's racist. And then, you know, they listen to these things for a while. And they're like, then they just are because they think, because they think that jokes are a form of speech in a vacuum with no meaning. Right. They're like, oh, it's just a joke. it doesn't mean anything. Yeah. And then they end up internalizing deeply transphobic or whatever. The joke does mean something and it and it contains a payload that goes into a person

and can like lodge there. It's like when you feed a dog medicine and you wrap it in like bacon. You know what I mean? I mean, that's a bad metaphor because it's medicine and as if like bacon is a joke. And I was going to say it's like met as if the medicine is transphobia. Incorrect. Okay, bad metaphor. But the point is the idea of like, yeah, they're trying to like, yeah, you slide an idea past.

Yeah. Yeah. What are you trying to slide past people with your comedy? What are you trying to get to get to them? Hopefully the opposite direction. I am very earnestly doing subtextual ideas, you know, by being like a white guy. But I'm talking about like my love for like butterflies and stuff like that. um that is uh subtextually um that's a feminine aesthetic thing to be into yeah and i am aware

of that and i'm trying to offer an alternative uh path for white boys along the lines of uh you know like more like in the jo pera type angle of like you don't have to be those shitty guy yeah you know uh my friend emily heller who is a wonderful comic she has been a little while since she's done stand-up she's been doing TV writing for a couple years but she's a great comic and we were talking about this stuff once and uh we're talking about why we do comedy and i forget what i said but she said i'm just doing comedy because i want people to know that someone like me exists and i was like oh that's really great i wish i got to do that what's your reason well i think now it is that you know i think i've like more found the parts of myself and i'm

like, oh, yeah, wait, I do feel a little different from other people or different from a traditional, like, white male masculinity or something that I am trying to just sort of like, be to people like, hey, this is how I am. And like, there's a, there's a different way if you should you choose, you know. Absolutely. Like, you're very like, I mean, like, very, very on its face, like, talking about neurodivergence. Like, it's like not, it's not subtextual. It's the context of your last. Yeah. And my new, my new, uh, hour is. about sexuality and stuff like that. Nice, nice. You haven't seen it. Yeah, the trade is that I got to watch it and punch it up. Yeah, go ahead. I would love to, I would love to hear your bunch of thoughts because you're one of my favorite comics.

Where can people find more of your ship, man, to see you? I'm around the streets. Find me on the streets. I am walking around town. I'm Feldfrog on everything. It's my last name, Feld, but then word frog instead of man. You can find me on Instagram, TikTok. the other various social media platforms

watch my stand-up comedy on YouTube. That's great. Thanks for so much for being here, Benny. You're the best. Thanks, man. That's a lot of fun. You're the man, dude. Yeah. Rock and roll. Hell yeah. Well, thank you to Benny Feldman for coming on the show. Once again, if you want to see both of us on stage together, well, head to the Bell House in Brooklyn on November 15th for New York Comedy Festival.

And just as a reminder, I'm also going to be at Tacoma, Washington, Spokane, Washington, Des Moines, Iowa, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, and Atlanta, Georgia, head to Adamconover.net for all those tickets and tour dates. If you want to support the show directly, head to patreon.com slash Adam Conover. Five bucks a month can do every episode. Add free for 15 bucks a month. I will read your name in the credits, or at least I'll read some of your names in the credits. And if you subscribe for 15 bucks a month for a while, eventually I'll get to yours.

This week, I want to thank Robert Fuss, Game Grumps, the famous Game Grumms from YouTube. Thank you so much for supporting the show. Paul McCollum, Rick Jane Nash, Howard and Kevin, Fatim Merkin, Darren Kay, and Matthew Reimer. If you want me to read your name, silly username, or business name at the end of my show, head to patreon.com slash Adam Conover. We would love to have you there at any level you decide to support the show. I want to thank my producers, Sam Routman and Tony Wilson.

Everybody here at HeadGum for making the show possible. Thank you so much for listening, and we're going to see you next time on Factually. That was a HitGum podcast.