The Comedy Cellar: Live from the Table - Louie Isn't Weinstein

Episode Date: November 18, 2017

The Louis CK discussion continues at the Comedy Cellar table

You're listening to The Comedy Cellar, live from the table, on the Riotcast Network, Riotcast.com. Let's try to keep the momentum going. Wouldn't it be better for her to get these headphones? Because she can't hear down there. She'll hear, she'll hear. No one says she'll hear. Chris is a loud mouth. If you can't hear, we'll figure it out.

All right, all right. Well, at least we have another Mike instead of Mike Sherridge. One, two. I'm going to be so quiet. I'm out of practice. Well, you'll be all right. And I'm on two hours sleep, so I'm a little sluggish. Okay.

Half these guys are gay for pay. Just. I'm a lineup. One second. Good evening, everybody. Welcome to the Comedy Cellar Show here on SiriusXM Channel 99, the Comedy Cellar Show. My name is Noam Dorman.

It's okay, Veronica. We're at the back table at the Comedy Cellar. How women are treated in comedy. And my name is Noam Dwarman. I'm here, as always, with my co-host, Mr. Daniel Natterman. Can you feel it, Noam? The podcast is at another level these days. And we have a blast from the past.

The beautiful and now is pregnant, Ms. Kristen Montella. What is it, Dave? My headsets, I can't hear very well. You know what? Why don't you, you're doing this every week, why don't you set your headsets up before the show?

Fucking thing. Anyway, Kristen Montella, she used to be a host on the show and then she quit. No one really knows why. We know exactly why. She quit because I didn't show proper care When her dog died

That is not why It really is true Her bulldog died And she loved it He was a great dog, Meatball And I said, to try to put it in perspective When you have children I think you'll see it differently

That is not what you said What did I say? You said, have a kid, you'll. Have a kid, you'll feel better. I said, get pregnant, you'll feel better. Same thing. In minced words. Minced words. And then she wrote back, I quit.

Yeah. So. I know. Now, let me finish introducing. Mehran, I can't pronounce your last name. Kagani. It's okay. Kagani.

Yeah. That's Persian, right? Iranian, even. Iranian. Yeah. Iranian. It hasn't been Persian for 85 years. Right?

No, it'll always be Persian. Oh, come on. Persian is the culture. No, you're just trying to, that's like, it's language that's being used to make people feel more comfortable, and that isn't my job. All right. Veronica Mosey. Veronica.

Hi. Who's been on this show before. And we have a special guest. Brendan O'Neill is editor of Spiked, the British online magazine with a global reach. He is currently taking part in Spiked's unsafe space tour of American campuses. Brendan is also columnist for Penthouse and Reason.

So this is actually great that you're here because you are a free speech guy. Yeah, oh yeah. And you've also written, I saw something online This is actually great that you're here because you are a free speech guy. Yeah. Oh, yeah. And you've also written, I saw something online that you wrote something about, it was in the context of England, but I suppose it transplants, that these sexual harassment cases, the accusations of all of it, you feel is mushrooming out of control. I think it is completely spinning out of control. So why don't you start us off with that? Because obviously you know about Louis and all the stuff that's happening around here.

So go ahead. I think the Me Too movement has spun completely out of control. I think it's become a monster. I think it's a new form of McCarthyism. It's a sexual McCarthyism. We're seeing the creation of new blacklists. We're seeing the destruction of people's careers on the basis of accusation alone. The only person I've seen make

a sensible comment about this is Jeremy Piven. Jeremy Piven has been accused of being a sexual abuser and he's denied it absolutely. He also said that we are entering dark times where men's careers can be destroyed by a Facebook post. And he's absolutely right right and we've seen that with Ed Westwick we've seen it with George Takai we've seen it with Piven himself the ease and speed with which someone can be destroyed by a pointed finger is something I think we should

be incredibly worried about I do think that it's slightly exaggerated what you're saying has merit but I don't think it's quite that easy to paint somebody as a sexual predator that is not a sexual predator. For example, if you said, if I went on Facebook, or say a woman went on Facebook, Chris Montella, and said that Ryan Hamilton was a sexual predator or Brian Kiley was a sexual predator. Nobody would believe it and it has to have some credibility and it can't just be one person

in the wilderness saying so but it's a sexual predator and it will stick. In relation to George Takai it's one person and it's something that happened in 1981 which makes it an allegation that is older than half of the people on the planet and with that one allegation he has been clouded in this suspicion of perversion.

Right-wing people are getting a complete kick out of this. They're absolutely loving the fall of this guy who they have always despised. I think we're entering, I think Piven is right. We are entering incredibly dark times. It's tactile. And the problem I have is this suggestion that we should always believe accusers. That's not a civilized way to approach criminal or sexual misconduct accusations. I would say to these people, would you believe the woman who accused Emmett Till of sexually harassing her?

Emmett Till was accused of touching her on the wrist, saying how about it. He was the one who was lynched, right? He was lynched. He was murdered. He was killed by racists. Because he was, because they instantly believed the woman who said that he touched her on the wrist. He said to her, how about it, baby? He wolf whistled at

her. It was all lies. I'm not saying that all the women are lying. What I'm saying is that. But even if you did that, that's like a general Tuesday night for me. Honestly, that's not even shocking. Can I read now? I've kind of said this spiel a few times, but can I actually read my Facebook post to you from a few months ago

so you can see how smart I am? All right. It says... It's longer than this. I'm going to edit it quickly. I said, we know what fair is. It took thousands of years, but we learned that fairness requires procedure,

right to cross-examination, explanation, evidence, et cetera. We set up procedures. Criminal, if that line is crossed. Civil, get a lawyer in suit for other violations. And labor, most corporations have some procedure for reporting harassment. We've short-circuited all three. Now the standard is what story is most likely to go viral, combined with how well or liked or hated you are.

Did Paul McCartney really beat his one-legged wife? Of course not. We love Paul McCartney. We're not expected to give Bill Clinton the same treatment as Bill O'Reilly, right? I mean, Bill Clinton's awesome. If I have an employee, I said, so just like the movie Death Wish, we should enjoy when the guilty get what they deserve when Charlie Bronson shoots the murderers,

but we should also stop and think about the dangers of vigilante, procedureless justice. You commit... Is that good? Yeah, it's fine. When you like applause, sound effect. There's this thing called the presumption of innocence, and people forget how important that is.

The presumption of innocence is the barrier between civilization and barbarism, right? Now, Brendan, the presumption of innocence... No, I know what you're going to say. All right, well, I'm going to say it anyway. The presumption of innocence and the idea of guilty beyond a reasonable doubt is true in criminal law. In civil law, it's preponderance of the evidence. No one makes decisions every day about people's careers.

He decides whether to hire them or not based on intuition... I'm a kingmaker, Brendan. ...incomplete evidence and gut feeling. And we're all entitled to do that in our daily lives. But he doesn't expel them from polite society under a cloud of sexual predation.

He doesn't. I don't know that George... That's the thing that he doesn't do. You can't attack that guy. Dan is actually not right. I mean, Dan, I want to tell you as a boss... He's not right or not wrong?

No, no. It's not as simple as what you're saying. When I'm in a position as a boss to have to try to figure out whether somebody stole something or somebody did something bad, even if I come to the thing, well, it seems like they probably did. I do not feel that's enough basis to fire somebody. Now, if I feel three times in a row they probably did it, then maybe it'll add up to something. Why can't this guy shake this rumor is the idea. Yeah, well, we had a thing with a waiter.

I mean, I gave him, literally, I gave him like four or five bites of the apple until he cost me $1,000 or more before I finally felt, no, now I really feel I have enough to fire him. The first couple of times I was like, it could have happened. It could have been an accident. But, you know, we all have... And the preponderance of the evidence was against him. But we all have private thoughts on the guilt or otherwise of various people.

O.J. Simpson, Kevin Spacey, we all think to ourselves, we know instinctively whether they're guilty or not. The problem is when you make those private thoughts public. And what's more, when you pull them together with hundreds of thousands of other people's private thoughts, so they create this momentum where society is basically saying, Kevin Spacey is guilty, Louis C.K. is guilty, cast them out, demonize them, they must never work again.

Louis is different because he admitted doing this. Yeah, that's true. And Spacey is fucking actually... Wait, wait, wait. Let me run this. Louis did it, but I think the estimation of how serious what he did is, is what we're facing with Louis. Well, yeah. It's like everything is getting painted with the same brush, which I think is a dangerous thing.

Because it doesn't, like, we are, at the end of the day, encouraging a world that thinks in an incredibly binary fashion. Absolutely. And doesn't see shades of gray. And that's problematic in and of itself. But the other issue is that that which is unspeakable is untreatable if people do have these like ways of thinking that might be wrong do you know what i mean for example my personal reaction to this in the beginning if i see a dick it's like finding a 20 on the sidewalk it really is like i love them i'm constantly waiting to trip over one uh like i will will lo-fi them. Good game. Like that.

But what I have found, because I was able to sort of, like, speak my very sexually liberated explicit truth, was that a lot of people do not feel that way. If I wasn't allowed to speak what I thought, then I wouldn't have gotten feedback that other people think differently. And when the conversation becomes incredibly prescriptive in terms of morality,

we don't have sort of a variety of thoughts and nobody gets smarter. Everyone's just sort of yelling in an echo chamber. Well, try arguing as a woman with the hashtag MeToo. I've taken a lot of flack from other women who don't like the fact that I say, as someone who was sexually assaulted, and actually I was raped when I was in my 20s, I'm okay. I managed to survive. I don't think it is the same thing as if a guy says to you, hey, nice tits. And that's the problem, is that now we're just kind of, I never thought rape would be a trend.

Like, drinks with the girls, hashtag me too. It's like, this is crazy. Because hashtag I was raped doesn't sound quite as funny and friendly and I think it's getting to be, it's scaring the shit out of men and I don't want that to happen in this society. It's very interesting what you're saying

because I've been asking a lot of women, feminists, about how they feel about the Louis thing and a lot of them are saying like... I say why didn't you fucking walk out? I'm sorry but I've had the same thing happen to me by someone who was a prominent writer on a television show as well, a different person,

literally almost the same thing, smoking pot in the cellar up at the comic strip at a Christmas party, and kind of hit on me, took his dick out, and was like, come on, Mosey. So that was nice. Hang on.

And I left, is my point. I left. So, a lot of feminist women I know, surprisingly, were like, you know, I actually don't think it's as bad as everybody's saying, whatever it is. But then a lot of other people will say to me, well, you have no right to say that because you don't know what it's like as a woman. And it reminds me, they use

the same argument about abortion a lot of the time. Like, you can't have an opinion on abortion because you're not a woman. My answer's always been, well, but there's plenty of women who are against abortion. Like, it's not...

So they only use that... They only... No, it's true. They only use that argument for the woke point of view. It's a defensive mechanism to avoid anybody from questioning them

rationally. Now maybe, like you were talking about thoughts, I've said this before, I have a lot of thoughts. Some may be very insightful. Some may be really dumb.

But I don't have the capacity to tell which is which. To do that, I need to be able to share them. And even if I'm wrong, just tell me I'm wrong.

But right now, if you share the wrong thought, you will be shut down and equipped. Yeah, you're an asshole. Immediately. But what's happening to, I think we have to get real. What's happening to Louis C.K. is absolutely terrifying because, firstly, as you

say, he's owned the bad behavior that he did. It's not criminal. People are using the term sexual misconduct. Some people have made the argument that it might have been. There's nobody doing time for that in Leavenworth. But you know what's really terrifying about the Louis C.K. case is what's happening to his work as a comic.

So his specials are being erased by HBO. His film release has been cancelled. And this really takes us into the territory of Stalinism. This is like Stalin erasing someone he's fallen out of favour with from a group photograph. Stalin was notorious for airbrushing out people who he just didn't like anymore. And I think a similar thing has happened. It's like 1984.

In 1984, if someone fell out of favor with Big Brother, they were memory hole. They were shoved down the memory hole. Their likenesses were banned. Old references to them in newspapers were erased. They were shoved in this hole and burnt to a cinder. Something similar is happening with Louis C.K. And this is what makes me think.

This raises an incredibly important question, which is can you appreciate the culture and art and entertainment of people who are accused of having done bad or suspicious things? And what I think the Louis C.K. thing demonstrates, the fact that his work is being abolished as well as his future, potentially, is that this has become, this has moved from being a progressive movement

that's all about justice to something that's much more about vengeance and censorship. Well, I can't tell if you're really, really smart or it's just the accent. No, I had made a joke that it turns out that Netflix has higher standards than the Democratic Convention. smarter is just the accent. No, I had made a joke that it turns out that Netflix has higher standards than the Democratic Convention. Who knew?

Like Bill Clinton. And can we really talk about it? I talk about the moral arithmetic. It's like everybody got a massive iPhone download and their new operating system now has taught everybody what to think and they have no recollection that they were thinking the other way.

Just a few weeks ago, the day before yesterday, people could not do the simple two plus two moral arithmetic to come to the conclusion on their own that Roman Polanski was a monster, that Bill Clinton was a rapist. All of this was beyond anybody's capacity. And now, all of a sudden, we are shedding real tears at the idea that Louis asked a girl if he could masturbate in front of her. And she laughed.

And we don't, I mean, this is, how do you explain this? Except it's just, in a sense, it's a lot of feigned concern and sheep. If I could, I'd like to get into the nuts and bolts, if you will. Careful. I wish I had the British accent. If I had the British accent, you guys would have let me finish. Go ahead. The nuts and bolts of the Louis case, because I think it's interesting.

My immediate reaction, I had heard the rumor probably for the first time about seven, eight years ago. I believed it was probably true. Then I heard further rumors. It's easy to believe when somebody does something that you're capable of. For me, it was hard to believe. There was an article in Gawker that appeared a few years ago and that lent more credence to the rumor. I think most people thought there was at least a reasonable chance, it was hard to believe. There's an article in Gawker that appeared a few years ago and that lent more credence to the rumor.

I think most people thought there was at least a reasonable chance that it was true. But I always thought, my feeling was, first of all, I didn't do business with Louis anyway, so there was nothing I could do, really. I did turn down a role in his show, but that was because I was going on a cruise. And, uh...

I don't like to cancel gigs. But I would have done it if I were in town. I didn't find the crime to be that outrageous because my thought was, as Veronica had stated, leave the room. Well, because even in the New York Times... But then I've talked to women, and I've talked to numerous women.

Some say they froze or they thought maybe if he was capable of doing that, he could be capable of something violent. I'm telling you, I'm taking so much shit for this from so many people that I know, but there's two of you. People say, oh yeah, but there were accounts where

he got in front of the door. I said, that was not what these women quoted. They did not say he got in front of the door. They said that he asked if he these women quoted. They did not say he got in front of the door. They said that he asked if he could take his dick out. They laughed and joked and said sure. And then he didn't. They didn't say sure. They explicitly did not say sure.

Okay, so they said. But they laughed. Yeah, but they laughed. They thought it was a joke. And then he proceeded to get naked. And I don't know how long it takes you guys to take your clothes off. They cheat erection, ejaculate. And I'm just saying that's a lot of time that's gone by.

And I'm kind of like, gone by. Can we say this? Can we say this much? It's possible it really was horrible, but we don't have any real basis. Even after we did Time's Arc, we don't know. I don't know. At what point is it someone's responsibility is the issue? At what point is it a grown woman's responsibility to say, you know what, this is going to be a bad choice for me? Plus, he was not

the Louis CK now that he was in 2002. 2002, he was nowhere near the level of fame that he is. So they're trying to paint it in a way to say, look what he did. And you're like, yeah, but he was just, I did Aspen when you were there, you hung out with people and you went out to the rooms and you did all kinds of, who knows who was hooking up with who or whatever. But I'm saying he was kind of on par with these girls. They were performing as well. They were not there as like groupies. I completely agree.

I think there's a real danger that not only are we demonizing men, but we are also infantilizing women. And in fact, I think women could prove to be the greatest losers from the Me Too movement. Because what it is suggesting is that women are incapable of negotiating public life or entertainment life or artistic life

by themselves, by using their own nous, by using their own abilities, their own... And Camille Pallier... I was just going to bring her up. She says if she was in a room with Harvey Weinstein and he started masturbating in front of her, she would have laughed at him and walked out.

Okay, but that's her. Women are against her. And the other thing that she said is that... First of all, I have to say, wait, Veronica, come on. No, no, no. In general, Camille Paglia said that working class women tend to have a more sort of... They have a greater sense of agency and shutting it down. Meaning like, go fuck yourself, never do that to me again.

Whereas people who are sort of higher class or from different socioeconomic backgrounds, more sheltered, they very well may freeze. And that's the thing, is that I came into this conversation also feeling that way. Like when you strip a woman of her agency and you're saying that she's not strong enough to be able to say no and get herself out of a bad situation, I don't want my daughter thinking that. I don't want my mother. I don't want any woman in my world

to feel like she can't take control of her life. That having been said, I have also heard from women who genuinely think, I had a friend who said if she was in 9-11 and saw a dick that day, the hardest part of her day would have been the dick. Do you know what I mean? For her, it really would have fucking fucked up her jam to see a dick that day, the hardest part of her day would have been the dick. Do you know what I mean? For her, it really would have

fucking fucked up her jam to see a dick that day. She was molested by her dad. She was fucking like, you know, this person has real sexual trauma and, you know, if she has that reaction, you can't argue with that reaction. That is one person's reaction.

I can't tell you that you have to react the way that I do. What you can say is that the degree of Louie's moral turpitude depends on his reasonable interpretation of the situation was it reasonable for him to assume that because they weren't leaving they were cool with it

would a reasonable reasonably constituted mentally sound individual, a reasonably constituted mentally sound person probably wouldn't have done this. Right. But, and that's important too. can we say he's a monster

or can we say maybe he really did think they were cool with it? Is that a possibility? Montella, we haven't heard from you. That's okay. What do you think about that? I mean, I think it's reasonable to assume that. For me, the issue is more about

not what happens to you, but how you choose to let that affect you going forward. I agree. Which is, I think,'s reasonable to assume that. For me, the issue is more about not what happens to you, but how you choose to let that affect you going forward, which is, I think, what Veronica said. And to read the New York Times article where it talks about all these women that then chose to not pursue comedy or avoided places because a person is there, I mean, to not confront the issue head on to me is

the biggest. I don't know if these women were forced to leave the comedy business because of inappropriate masturbation. But one time I was forced to leave a steam room because of masturbation. They internalize it to mean that they did. You know, there are people who said they didn't pursue comedy because of that. I'm afraid

I don't know. I'm afraid maybe we just for wouldn't say it was. One second, one second. I don't know who that was. I'm afraid maybe we... Just for the listeners. I think we all agree. Like my wife, if she was at work and her co-worker did this to her,

I'd be really angry at this fucking guy. I don't want to... Of course. So I think we're talking... We're talking very philosophically here. And I think

but for some people listening, they may not realize that. I think we all basically have the assumption that what he did is creepy and deserves to be angry about this. The question is, should he be like, I said yesterday, like, imagine people, Dan says, it's okay, he's got money. I didn't say it's okay, he's got money. You said he lost everything. I said, no, he did not. And I see it more like you're a painter and somebody tells you, listen,

you're never going to pick up a brush again, but don't worry about it. You got money. The thing is that I think we all agree that it's probably bad behavior and you shouldn't masturbate. I think it is bad behavior. You should not

masturbate in front of someone. But even asking is like, that was the smartest thing he wrote. It's a predicament. But he asked, in that article, or in his apology rather, he said, he said,

I asked. What he didn't say was, they answered. Now, if he really thought there was consent, I would, in a letter, I would say,

I thought, God is my witness. I know it's crazy as it sounds. I thought they were down with it. Now why didn't he say that in his apology? But the thing is, so there's the act itself, which we don't really know the ins and outs of, right? We have one

person's testimony and we have another person's testimony. So that's, we can make judgments, but we're not sure. But then there is the cultural atmosphere in which it's being talked about and which it's being understood. And I think that's where the problem lies. And I think it's a cultural atmosphere in which people's been talked about and in which it's being understood and i think that's where the problem lies and i think it's a cultural atmosphere in which people are invited to think of themselves as victims and to remember events as being damaging in an incredible way where they may not otherwise have been seen in that way i think it's a cultural atmosphere

in which women are encouraged to see themselves as victims and needing help. Men are seen as demons and predators and dangerous. And in which we are encouraged to always believe every single accusation made against the so-called sexual predator. So there's the act itself which we can talk about until the cows

come home and we won't agree on. I would like to, by the way. But then there's the culture in which it is filtered. And I think the real problem with I would like to, by the way. But then there's the culture in which it is filtered. And I think the real problem with what's happening to Louis C.K. now, which I think is incredibly unjust, regardless of whether he did this to the women, and I believe he probably did.

He said he did. He said he did. He took ownership of what he did. What's incredibly unjust is this suggestion that his work must be erased and that he can never work in this town again and that he cannot be a funny man again. Because what you're doing then is you are punishing someone for life for a mistake they made. And the whole point of universal, civilized, democratic, progressive justice is that people take ownership of the things they did wrong.

And Christianity. And Christianity. They take ownership of what they did wrong. They pay for it. And then we allow them to come back into society. Well, he will come back. He will. Because his demographic is between 18 and 25.

There's a lot of money to be made. His next special. Louis C.K. His next special. Louis C.K. He's going to do a joke about it. Louis C.K. coming at you. I hate you.

Will probably sell more copies than any other special of all time. So ridiculous. What are you laughing at? What are you laughing at? That's not addressed here is the desperation that people have. Nobody really addresses this, but the idea of like, let's talk about Weinstein for a second. I have been in this business now for 20 years. Still not where I want to be. However, you know, it's like I've gone on a bazillion auditions.

I've done all this crazy crap to try to get, you know, up, up, up, up. And Harvey Weinstein says, watch me shower and I'll make you a star. I think that's a good deal. I really do. I held a homeless guy's dick for a dollar. Well, of course it's a good deal. I'm just saying, that's exactly what I was saying. You think I wouldn't massage Harvey Weinstein for a fucking Oscar? Guys, guys, guys, I hope you're just being provocative. But that's me. Again, that's me.

No, no, you don't get it because you're not, you are a great artist. I am a comedian, by the way. You are a great musician, but your greatest love is family, home, and heart. That is not our greatest love. Our greatest love is conquest. So you don't get it because you're not a crazy, crazy comedian. But the fact is

is if I could make it by watching Harvey Weinstein shower, I certainly would. Thank you for backing me up on that. But what does that have to do with anything? He shouldn't be asking you to shower. And that's exactly right.

All right, that's another point. And the coercion is problematic. When did I become a liberal all of a sudden? I was just joking around. For God's sake, it's a fucking comedy seller podcast. This is exactly the problem. Nobody thinks you were joking.

No, you would. I would. Actually, I would. I would hope maybe more. Maybe Oprah. I'd watch Oprah. But here's the thing. All of us can have our hearts in the right place.

You know what I mean? I'm sure everyone at this table has done stuff to help women in comedy actively in the front lines. But we can't talk about these things. These things have become so completely unmentionable that to even joke about them, to try to add nuance to it, there is a script that you have to stick to in talking about this.

And if you deviate from that script, you are fucking dead. Well, it's about everything in politics. And that's just the reality. And, like, what ends up happening is that people who are fucking sinister, who do diabolical and awful shit, will speak the script and just skate by.

And people who actually work to do good in the world will say something nuanced and get shut the fuck down. I'm always suspicious of those guys on Facebook that are like, when I hear the word rape culture out of a guy's mouth, I immediately think, this motherfucker's up to something. Yeah, he's weird. I may be wrong. Yeah.

I may be wrong, but it's these guys. What do you mean he tries to... Male feminists of the world. Male feminists. I don't get it. Yeah, sure. One guy told me, you need to shut up and listen to women.

And by the way, as Noam said, I am listening to women, and half of them are like, get out and leave the room. So they don't want me to listen to women, they want me to listen to the women that agree with them. That was your point and it was a good one. I just wanted to put my spin on it.

I think we underestimate, or some people underestimate the crisis that comedy faces at the moment. There was an article in The Guardian this week, there was an article in The Guardian this week, and the headline was if you're still laughing at Louis C.K. you are part of the problem. So what we have here is not simply the questioning of individuals' behavior, but the attempted destruction of their culture. I don't think it will succeed, right? Because he's an influential guy. He's very funny. He's

talented. He'll come back. I think you're right. But there is this effort to destroy or erase his culture, and that has to be taken very seriously. Another thing that's happened this week, of course, is the release of the film The Problem with Apu, which is this new film by Harry... Kandabulu. Right, I can't say his name, which probably makes me racist as well. He's made this new film about the problem with Apu from The Simpsons, and it's that it's a stereotype and it's racist and it makes life hard for Asians. What is happening, I think,

is that we are entering into very dark, humorless times where people judge culture not by whether it's entertaining or moving, but by whether it adheres to a certain political and moral standard.

That's the death of comedy because comedy needs an instant laugh. If you're sitting there thinking, is this problematic, or is this racist, or is this sexist, then you've missed it. That's what happened to Larry David last week

on SNL when he made the jokes about coming out to girls in the concentration camps or whatever, which I thought was hilarious. I have detected a slight problem here. Brendan wants to talk about the impact on comedy of the current PC culture.

I want to talk about Louis jacking off. Go ahead, talk about it. So we have to determine which way we're headed. We get to a certain level of intellectual, Dan has to just bring it down. You should say whatever you want about him jerking off, and then he should just talk about the— and without even—you don't even have to engage each other.

Okay. It's just like— But I think his conversation is interesting, but I would just— I wanted to really get in—really break down the morality of what we all think of what Louis did. And, for example, you know, in his apology statement, he said that, he basically implied that the real reason this was wrong was because they admired me and I was big in the business. And I'm thinking, if you can't fuck someone that admires you, who the fuck are you going to fuck?

I think I understand what that was. I think that he did not want to say anything that could get him afoul of a legal action. And to say, to imply that he actually did something based on power in the workplace, I don't know what the statute of limitations is, but potentially that could be problematic.

Legally, they can't do anything to him. He also didn't have higher fire authority In these situations Harvey Weinstein is sitting there Sitting on a big bag of money And is like I'm producing a movie And I have all my friends in this business And you won't work for fucking three years

By the way I hired Mossad If you talk in ten years I'm going to fuck you over It's a big difference I'll say this about Dan's thing I feel uncomfortable talking about it. I've got to be honest because I know Louis. We're not friends, but I know him, and he's been very important in my life. And I don't want to discuss him and get a laugh out of it.

It makes me uncomfortable, but I hope he'll forgive me if he's listening, but I'll make make exception for this. Beating off in front of women was plan B for Harvey Weinstein, right? I don't, Louis did not seem to have any interest in getting these girls into bed to begin with. Like, this was the end in itself, you know? That's his thing. That's his fetish.

Which in a way makes him less of a predator. Yeah. Like, Harvey Weinstein, you're trying to fuck me, trying to fuck, they wouldn't fuck him, so he beats off Like Harvey Weinstein, trying to fuck me, trying to fuck me. They wouldn't fuck him, so he'd be soft. But you know, it's really possible, if we're going to talk about Louis C.K., what he actually did in those bedrooms or those hotel rooms,

we have to accept that it's possible he's being punished now, or possibly punished, for his fetish, for his kink, for what he likes sexually. Because there is no suggestion, or it's a very vague suggestion, if there is, that he actually forced these women to watch him,

or that he used any kind of menace. So it's possible that... Can you pause that? You think the New York Times reporter would on the record say, ask you, did you feel threatened? Yes. And print the answer. That's right.

We need that information. If they all went around joking about it, they would have. I understand, but that's what's so disgusting about it. No, but the thing is, if we are going to bring guys down and harass them and call them sexual predators because they like masturbating in front of women, then we are judging sexual proclivities and sexual behavior. I'm not with you on that one. No, but the thing is, I think you're right. The difference between Weinstein and Louis C.K. is very clear to me.

Weinstein was in a position of power over a lot of these women. And he literally said, I'll make you or I'll break you. I'll make you a star if you do all this. And so there was an element of pressure. I still think, as it happens, women could have walked out. I do too. But it was an element of pressure. I completely agree.

The issue with Louis C.K. is that it seems to me from every... I've read that New York Times piece, the original piece, three times, because I kept thinking, am I missing something? Every time I read it, I was looking for the element of force. I was looking for the element of men. I was looking for the element of pressure, and I could not see it. Now, go ahead. I actually do have something, because, you know, I'm a big fag,

both in size and in magnitude. Did I say that out loud? You can. I can. Yeah, yeah. But so I am a big fag. I'm a big practicing fag. And when I came out and when I came to terms with my sexual orientation, it was absolutely unacceptable to be gay. My employment rights weren't protected. I was considered mentally ill. I wasn't allowed to couple in a way that was protected. That is the environment that I was born into.

So when I came out, and as part of my sort of reconciling my identity and making it unassailable to a world that, like, felt free to quiz me at bars and shit about it, I had to make peace with my sexual actions and make them unassailable, right? When I read about Louis, and so as a result, I know lots of kinky people, I know people who practice their kink, and I know people, because they've been forward and able to talk about their kinks, they have found appropriate avenues to

exercise and practice them. In Louis' case, what I keep reading, it seems like he just didn't, he could have found a more appropriate way to exercise and practice his kink. Hire a hooker, perhaps. Hire a hooker. Find people who are into CFNM, Clothed Female Naked Male. It's a thing.

What is it? CFNM, Clothed Female Naked Male. That was a Canadian rock stage. And it's a very, it's a real kink. It's a real fetish. It has a name. How do you know about this? Because I'm a big fag and I eat dicks all the time.

Is this on the dark web or something? I've never heard of this. It's not on the dark web. Anything involving clothing is not on the dark web. People who have to talk about their sexual orientation and people who have to defend their sexual orientation end up hearing about more shit. And so I've heard about more shit.

Now, Mehran, there are those that say, regarding your more appropriate scenario, it has been posited that the very kink that Louis had was that women are uncomfortable. He likes them to be uncomfortable. I don't know if that's true. Others have said, with regard to your question about was there force, and I don't really necessarily agree with this, others have said, and Louis in his own statement implied, that the force was is that Louis had

power in the business, and there was an implication that if they didn't go along, there might be repercussions. Louis didn't say that in his statement. He didn't say it in his statement, but he said it's because they admired him. They should have said that to the Times. A lot of people have said, a lot of people have said, not to women necessarily, that the very fact that Louis was

a big deal in the business, although far less so in 2002, was in and of itself made the consent, compromised the consent. This is crappy journalism. It's like a big Rorschach test. People are saying that now. I don't agree

with that. I think just because somebody might take revenge on you if you say no anybody could potentially take revenge after being rejected but you know the real problem i think this comes back to something veronica said earlier the real problem is the conflation of different forms of behavior so on one side we have people who uh people are telling their stories that harvey weinstein asked them for a drink and they said no and ran away and that's a hashtag me too moment. And that's a me too moment.

And then it goes through to he raped me, which is an incredibly serious thing. The assailed are. But, you know, the Louis C.K. stuff, I think the question has to be, if we are going to punish someone in the public sphere, we're going to try to expel them from public life or we're going to demonize them or try to destroy their reputation. We have to have a standard of proof. We have to have a level at which they have broken through and done something that society

more broadly agrees is bad or wrong or criminal. Well, then what responsibility do journalists have? Louis C.K. hasn't done that as far as I'm concerned. Well, I think they should let the consumer decide. Put his movie out or whatever. I mean, Mike Tyson's on Broadway as a convicted rapist. He has a cartoon.

That could have gone either way. I don't need them filtering it for me. I never thought Mel Gibson... I hated Mel Gibson as an anti-Semite. I never thought he should be able to make movies. I don't need you people to keep me from this. It's the Wagner question.

Can you appreciate Wagner knowing he was an anti-Semite? This has been a... I don't need you people to keep me from this. It's the Wagner question. It's the Wagner question. Can you appreciate Wagner knowing he was an anti-Semite? This has been a separate art. There's a better Wagner question. I don't know if you know this. In Israel, the Israeli Philharmonic Orchestra had a big debate about whether to play Wagner. And they chose, they wanted to play Wagner despite his association with the camps and everything. Because the art was so good. I think this is the great question of our time.

Can you appreciate the art and entertainment of people who have done bad or questionable or even criminal things? It's easier when they're figures in the past. I listen to Chris Brown all the time. Good night, good day, sir. I like Chris Brown.

What he did to Rihanna was incredibly bad. Evil. Even worse than Louis. Nasty. Much worse than Louis. It was a brutal, brutal crime. It's amazing he's walking free. It's a question of Philistinism.

I think it is incredibly Philistine to say you cannot appreciate, you cannot laugh, as The Guardian says this week, you cannot laugh as the guardian says this week you cannot laugh at louis ck anymore because of what he did you cannot listen to wagner because of what he thought but i cannot listen to chris brown or dance to chris brown because of what he did and what he paid for doing this is the key thing roman polanski might be might be different because he ran away from judgment but even there roman polanski has made great movies since he committed that

awful offense, allegedly. So the question of separating... Allegedly great movies or allegedly... And the offense isn't alleged. His young victim... I completely believe it, but I mean... Legally, there's never been a court case.

I think there should be one. But what I'm saying is that can you separate the culture from the person who produced that culture? If we went back in time and judged everyone by the standards of today, we would not watch anything. We would not look at any piece of art. We would not read any piece of literature because they were crazy

people. Comedians, deviants? I mean, in a way, all of us are deviants because we... I love that you're saying this. I've done, I've just never, they've never been public. Like what? I don't know. I'm trying to think. I'm not going to put that stuff out there. That's exactly right you're not. That's exactly right you're not. I'm just saying, you may not tell me that there's not one, but I'm saying like, you think that other comedians have not done something similar to Louis C.K. hitting on a girl just a little too hard?

I'm just saying, as Jim Norton walks by. Actually, you know what? Jimmy's one of the most respectful guys. He's the sweetest guy in the whole entire world. How do you guys feel about Anthony Weiner? He's a pervert. What? Well, how do you feel about Anthony Weiner?

I mean, should he be going to jail? Again, pervy pig grows. But, like, do you see that, like, sex, that, like, it always comes down to sex. It's like, oh, you did something sexually weird. It's one thing to do something that's sexually transgressive. It's one thing to put someone in a really shitty, shitty situation. It's another thing just to have a weird thing that you do sexually, and it will bring you down.

It will destroy your name. Wait, can I just say one thing? Veronica touches on an important point that we've discussed here a lot, which is that, and we're kind of glossing over, which is that comedy is supposed to be a safe space for the people who watch it, for the people who perform it,

etc. And what's most problematic to me about and relates to what you're saying about the death of comedy is that the women who are complaining, or I don't want to say complaining, it sounds negative, butK whatever you want to call it are comics and so they're not people who are outside of that space who kind of don't get it and I think that all the time about it the comedians if you're in that circle I and maybe it's wrong of me to think that but I feel like there's there should be another layer of understanding or awareness or whatever you want to call it in terms of how you deal within that circle.

I agree. I always thought that. I'm like, your comics, your female, like female comics have to be really strong. If someone did that to me, I would laugh. I'd come to the table. I'd talk about it the next day. Bitches to be in this business. But you'd look at someone like Joan Rivers, right?

And some people, female comics in this world have to be strong in order to deal with it, but they also have to be strong in order to deal with the censorious backlash that is becoming incredibly common right now. My issue is that comics are deviants by definition almost because they are deviating from the normal moral script and they are taking the piss out of society in various different ways they are confronting us with shocking ideas and images and and juxtapositions and so on right that's in the artistic level now in that doesn't mean that in the private level

they can do whatever they want to women or do whatever they want to young men or anything else but my concern with the louis cK. thing, and I think we're going to see this more and more, is that the judgment of the man's behavior is crossing the line into a judgment of his comedy. And the role of comedy.

But I've seen a lot of people... On Facebook, I'm seeing people saying, he's funny, but he's not funny. People are saying he's funny, but he's not. I'm not seeing people saying he's not funny. I'm seeing people saying he's funny, but he's morally reprehensible. No, they're saying he's funny, but you're no longer permitted to want to enjoy it. That was Netflix's decision. I've not heard people on Facebook saying, how dare you watch it?

Netflix made a business decision that may be right or wrong. But look at Kevin Spacey. He is being airbrushed as we speak from a film and replaced with Christopher Plummer like he was some kind of, as I said earlier, like a Stalinist official. Pedophile. Okay, I have two things. First of all, I think they were right to take Kevin Spacey out for the following

reason. That people going to see that movie now are going to be thrown out of the headspace that a director wants them to be in when they see Kevin Spacey's head come up in that movie. It's too new. If I was the director, I don't know why they did it, but just for commercial reasons. Listen, at some point, the guy who's invested the money and hopes to recoup the money has to make some decisions from a different point of view. And from his point of view, this is the best way to make sure my movie makes money

and I get my money back. And I wish it weren't the case, but I don't know that I can judge that. He needs his movie to be successful. Does Kevin Spacey deserve it? That I have no idea. I totally get what you're saying. If I can actually just switch lanes for a second. We were talking about the culture of comedy for a second. And something that I think needs to be said, just because it's kind of an elephant in the room,

is that this behavior, and yes, women do have to be tough to be in this business. We all have to be tough to be in this business. As a homo, I have to. Trust me, I have to be tough. But something that needs to be said is that men explicitly do not have to deal with this shit. That this is to a certain extent like a 50 pound weight that a woman has to carry while she's trying to do the same job as her male peers. That you have to be cool about someone maybe biting your tit. Do you know what I mean?

Do you know what I mean? It's like, ha ha, I was just playing. Let me bite your tit. And for the record, I've never bit Natterman's tit. And the night is young. And I realize that maybe I'm not pulling my weight. Do you know what I mean? Maybe I need to be sexually victimizing my male peers.

Can I bring in the wiener thing? Because Dan is related. That's not a very, very funny question. Easy, man. So Dan made fun of me, and you might be surprised, but a couple months ago, I was up in the audience because on the channel guide on Fios, my daughter wanted to read. I remember you showing me. It's like pre-teen, hairy, barely legal girls get off on big black rods. And I'm like, why is it okay for Verizon to glorify as like nothing to be ashamed of interest in barely legal sex?

Social norms matter. We create culture to protect ourselves from our own bad things, right? It's totally okay to be into barely legal women. And what does barely legal mean? The actors are above age but they look like they're... So of course,

Anthony Weiner's out there in this environment and some 15-year-old girl and it spirals down to him sending her a picture and at that point we say,

what the fuck is the matter with you? Yeah, that's right. Anthony Weiner sent you something to a young person. Are you some kind of pervert?

I mean, did you see the movie that Verizon is trying to get me to pay $5 to see? It's all about what I just did. Yeah, but they're actually legal though? I mean, did you see the movie that Verizon is trying to get me to pay $5 to see it's all about what I just did? Yeah, but they're actually legal though.

I understand, but I'm saying, do you see there's not an intellectual hypocrisy there? Well, look at it. I understand we have to protect ourselves against Anthony Wieners,

but I'm saying, can we also take stock in the culture that we're creating where that becomes a totally predictable result? Well, that's like the whole, that's why the whole hashtag Me Too movement is so interesting to me

because we live in a society where the number one followed woman in the world is Kim Kardashian, who takes big pictures of her ass right after her kid's born. And then women are like, I don't want to be looked at sexually, but I do want to take a thousand

Instagram pictures of myself so I get looked at sexually but I do want to take a thousand Instagram pictures of myself so I get looked at sexually I'm not saying that there's a what's happening it's like are we empowered or are we weak like I don't know what's going on but porn porn culture is not a good thing I heard my eight year old niece singing a

Rihanna song about beating someone with chains recently and it horrified me she's eight years old. When I was eight years old, I was singing the theme tune to Scooby-Doo. This is the difference. Yeah, but I sang like a virgin. I mean, you know, that's... Well, so did I. We're slightly older than eight. But the thing is, but my view of porno culture, which I think is not a good thing, is I think it actually is fed by the current, the kind of scandals we're currently living through. Because the more you tell people that men are dangerous,

women are fragile, sex is risky, you should never go to someone's bedroom, you never know what they're going to do to you, the more you make sex seem like something dangerous and suspicious and weird. And that is encouraging, I think, a new generation, particularly a new generation of young men, to go online and look at sex and masturbate because they are scared

of entering into the sphere of sex. I'm not sure about that. I think they just turned 13. No, but I think there is a link between the moral panic that surrounds sexual relations and sexual interactions and the growth of

porn. The more we say to people that intimacy is dangerous and sex is dangerous, the more likely people are going to have sex with robots or are just going to masturbate all day long. The robots can't come soon enough for me. Seriously? Solve everybody's problem here. But for example, you're English, right?

I just watched a show called Naked Attraction. Oh my God. Right? Which I'm like living for. It's like the best dating show ever. They present six eligible people and they present them like body parts at a time. So first they just show their genitals, then their tits, then their faces, and a different person is eliminated at each round on this dating show.

They show their dick at the end? I'm living. It's horrifying. No, it's horrifying. It's the best show on television. The first thing you see of this person is their dick or their vagina. Naked dick?

Yes. Completely naked. What network? Channel 4. What's the purpose? What happens? It's a dating show where they present naked.

They can show that on Channel 4? Yes, on Channel 4. We show really bad. But for the record, it's so demystified. They show the dick? Yes. The dick 4. We show really bad. But for the record, it's so demystified. They show the dick? Yes. The dick.

And all kinds of dicks. Dicks that look like from the fucking upside down on fucking Stranger Things. Wait, how can this be on Channel 4? Fucked up dicks. Go ahead, go ahead, go ahead. But the demystification that happens is, I watched five episodes last night. Do you know what I mean? And I'm going, I can't wait to like do

my gigs tonight and i go home and marathon more but uh but it's the it's so demystified like the sex isn't what's made wrong in fact like the the conversation is like they're there to like make each other feel better about themselves massage one another self-esteem no no no no but it's like you know it's like you're a curvy girl like you get to be naked in the world

you don't have to feel ashamed like you know Angelina Jolie doesn't have to play you in your biopic like you know Kathy Bates can it's alright

you know what I mean like that's the kind of but they're still eliminating people based on genitals yes they are they are

they absolutely are what's the show called again? Naked Attraction. And I literally can't wait. I got a DVR. It has caused a huge controversy in Britain. I think it's incredibly bovine, actually, because it's this quite animalistic judgment.

Yes. Oh, totally. How big is the penis? How nice is the vagina? How nice are the breasts? And then you don't see the face until the very end. And they can't talk until after you see the face. And then they go on a date after the show

with their clothes on. Sounds very healthy. It's weird. Honestly. But the thing is, I think that actually comes back to the question of what is causing the pornographic culture that I actually think is a problem. This whole, you know, if you look at Nicki Minaj's new cover photo for Paper

Magazine, I actually think it's really pretty grotesque right it's got three versions of nikki minaj in one image of her she's kind of pretending to lick her own vagina in another she's tweaking her own nipple and i and my my nieces and nephews are huge fans of nikki minaj and i am genuinely terrified that they will see this photograph which is all over the internet but my belief is that porno culture is not necessarily a good thing, but I think it is intimately, so to speak, linked to the problematization of sexual intimacy.

Because if you demonize that stuff, if you demonize getting drunk, touching someone on the leg, chatting someone up, trying something on with, then people are going to revert into their own, own-anistic world where they pleasure themselves. So I think there's actually a link between those two things. That's my issue. Or it just makes it more intriguing and people are going to eventually just get into more and more kink and nothing's going to be, you know, satisfying. What if the sexual conversation could open up? I mean, honestly, it's like, I think about this,

and it's like, none of you knew what CFNM was. None of you. If Louis knew about it when he was 13, maybe he would have had a healthier relationship with this, and we wouldn't be hearing this story. But again, when the conversation gets shut down, nobody gets to cry. That's right.

Absolutely nobody gets, like, information doesn't get out. Opinions don't change. I came into this feeling fully like, he got consent. Fuck this noise. Women have agency. Feel strong. Get the fuck out of there. I felt that way.

And I voiced my opinion. And the people close to me were able to be like, I have a different opinion than you. I have a different experience than you. And I got to grow as a result of putting my ideas out. I do believe it's a way of educating. Also that women need to be educated more smartly.

That's why I do like Camille Patlia because she is a feminist, but she's smart. She'll say, should she's, she's smart. Like she'll say, you know, should a woman be able to walk into a frat house completely naked and not have anyone look at her or talk to her or hit on her or whatever? Sure. Is that going to happen? Absolutely not. The reality is we have something called biology. And I think that, that it is natural for people to want to, uh, pursue the opposite sex. However, we have rules and laws

and permission and, you know, I'm losing my train of thought because I'm just thinking about being naked in a friend house. Sorry. We're increasingly expecting... Ah, the old days. We're increasingly expecting sex to be risk-free.

The idea that you can have sex and that everyone will completely agree on everything and it will be nice and normal and you'll sign a consent form beforehand and it will be nice and normal and you'll sign a consent form beforehand and and you you'll both kind of put your signatures or agree on every single that's not how sex works and anyone who's ever had sex knows that if you go to campuses today on i've never had sex you've never had sex on british on british campuses in oxford and cambridge ox, Oxford and Cambridge are the oldest,

poshest universities in Britain. It is now compulsory for students to have sexual consent classes in their first year. So these are 18-year-olds who are having to be educated about sex. Because we live in an increasingly frigid world in which people don't understand, I think, that having sex involves taking risks. You might get hurt. You might do something that you don't understand, I think, that having sex involves taking risks. You might get hurt. You might do something that you don't 100% want to do. It's not like a business transaction. I think it's a lot of business transactions.

Red Butler taking Scarlett O'Hara and kissing. You've been kissed by someone. I'm supposed to look at this now and say, this is horrible. This is horrible. I think in 99.9999% of cases, there's no issue. I mean, you know, in terms of, it's pretty clear when you're not getting consent. I don't see the idea that, you know, there's risk involved.

It shouldn't be risky. Now Dan's talking about something he's an expert in. Go ahead. Right. Not getting consent. No, but there is a difference. I mean, how often. When you're begging getting consent. No, but there is a difference. I mean, how often... Getting rejected.

When you're begging, begging, begging, they're like, fine. How often is a reasonable man confused about whether the girl wants it or not? If there's ambiguity, you don't do it. And I don't think it's too complicated. No, can I just clarify what I'm saying? I think there is a difference between sex without consent which is an incredibly murky area and rape rape was traditionally understood as sex in defiance of a lack of consent now that might sound pedantic but what it means is that you you had criminal intent so you knew criminal intent means that you knew

there was a lack of consent and you carried on regardless. So there was a knowledge that there's no consent here. She might be expressing it verbally or physically, but you know, and you carry on. So there's an element of criminal intent. Sex without consent is a far murkier phrase because that can include drunken sex, sex on marijuana, sex when you don't really want to do it. Literally all the sex I've ever had. Right, all the sex you've ever had. So I think the conflation of sex without consent with rape is incredibly problematic.

Because I think most human beings, most decent human beings over the age of 16 or 18 understand what rape is. Rape is when you have sex with someone and they are telling you not to and everyone knows that is a deeply profoundly serious crime but if you have sex with someone because you've had eight pints of beer and she's had six glasses of vodka and you're having sex and no one really knows what's going on that is not necessarily rape. But no one's condemning that either. They are. They are. And further, this Me Too,

they're throwing everything else possibly in with that and calling these women brave. Like, that kills me. If they came out when it happened to them, that would be brave. Yeah, I agree. Riding the wave now when how many people have been hurt after.

You girls are tough. That's not great. I'm not saying. I'm not with you. The general consensus is that they were suppressed and they were told that they wouldn't have careers if they did this. None of them had careers anyway. Yeah, but that's what I'm saying. I don't know if I necessarily.

I don't think it was that explicit. I don't know. Again, if he were Louis C.K. now, I would get it. But it's also the perception. One at a time, one at a time. They talk about perceiving it that way, that they wouldn't have. I haven't seen one article where somebody said to them, if you do this, you will not get X or whatever.

And maybe that did happen. How does Louis get back? How does Louis get back? I'm saying, like, if he could only go to the police station, turn himself in, and do some time, whatever it is, or whatever, then he would say, like Mike Tyson, you know, I've done it. But he's kind of in limbo because there's nothing precise.

We're not even sure he did anything criminal. So how will he get back? I wish he would come in here and want to go on. Right. He should keep a low profile for a minute. I think so, absolutely. Because honestly, there are so many pitchforks and torches out there right now where even like-

Can I interrupt you? You know what the problem is? I meant to say this before, and this goes exactly to what we're saying. Nobody talks on the phone anymore. I haven't had a real phone call to talk in seven years. In the last week, I've had almost 10 different comedians call me to talk about this because nobody wants it in writing. Everybody's afraid.

I mean, it's shocking to people I phone you on the phone. It's fostering communication. Everybody's chatty, Mehran. Everybody's chatty all of a sudden. And what does it tell you? Because everybody knows this kind of McCarthyism is going on. Yeah, absolutely. And there is a big gulf between what people know they should say in public,

the hostage video recitation of what's going on in public, and private thoughts, maybe this, maybe that. I'm not sure. I live for you saying this, and I agree. I don't want to be insensitive. Like I said one time, and I think this a lot, and it was a little crazy. If I were religious, what I would really pray for, first, is the ability to see the actual

truth. Like, unaffected by trends and people around me. Like, because it's beyond almost any human. We have our biases, you know? I want to know the truth of what's right in this instance. And being able to talk about it is the only way you're going to get close to it, and you can't talk

about it. I mean, you guys, all you guys spouting off all this stuff, you're all taking a risk in a way. Abso-fucking-lutely. And you shouldn't because maybe you're wrong. And believe me, I know you are. You're all ready to listen to the fact that you might be wrong if somebody can explain it to you. Are you kidding me? It's like that's the reason to talk about things. Of course.

Is so that you can actually like bend and wobble and adjust and get to what's right. I love being right, but I'm not going to be right in a bubble. I'm not going to be right in a vacuum. I'm going to be right because I get more and more data. But I think precisely that I completely agree with you. And the fact that people feel they cannot say what they think about this or what they genuinely feel about it sums up how this is spinning out of control. And it's gone beyond a kind of a search for justice

or a search for a kind of closure on certain events. And it's become this kind of freewheeling, illiberal, McCarthyist, sexual McCarthyism, where not only can you not do certain things in front of other women, which we all may agree you shouldn't do, but you

cannot even express an opinion on the ability of people to come back into public life. This is the, it goes by other things too. For instance, let me give you an example. Like, Andrew Sullivan, brave homosexual man, wrote something in New York. He was the first one to do it. You're not even, like all this criminal justice stuff, the police, whether they're killing

unarmed black men, not killing unarmed black men, you're not allowed to ask for the data. And as a matter of fact, there's quite a lot of data that's coming out that is and it's just getting buried. Eric Holder cleared, he cleared Darren Wilson of killing Michael Brown. He said, Darren, you can't talk about that. You can't even talk about what is proven true.

You can't even wonder. You have to accept. You have to come to the conversation with the correct opinion. There is no conversation. And in a sense, every, I hate to use the word politically correct, someone's got to give me another term for it, but every kind of handed down, prescriptive morality, I call it middle class morality.

The other thing is, though, is that... We're out of time, so we have to wrap it up. Well, you asked the question, how does Louis get back? Yeah. And the answer is, with time, Louis has millions of people that are on his side right now. And love him. And love him.

Now, for the rest of his life, he's going to be that guy that jerked off in front of those women. That's not going to change. That happens when you get naked and pull out Big Red in front of... Little Louis. Or Little Pink. We don't know. A comedy duo, which is crazy to begin with. Who the fuck jerks off in front of a comedy duo?

Just the notion of it is absurd. How do you get hard? Whoa, Hardy, look at this. The smothered pig. It's an odd thing, you know. You'll grant me. So he'll always be that weirdo. And there'll always be people, whenever he goes out to eat,

somebody will come up to him and say, You're disgusting. That's gonna happen. But, he's still gonna sell. His next special, Louis C.K. Exposed, will sell... Will break records. And he has to be honest.

I didn't take him at his word when he said, they admired me. That's why it was wrong. You know, I thought, I don't know why he said that. To me, that doesn's why it was wrong. You know, I thought, I don't know why he said that. To me, that doesn't make a difference. I think they thought he was Jesus Christ incarnate. He could still fuck them if they agreed to it. I think it was legally

careful language. That's what I think. In any case, give him a year. Let him go to Tahiti and chill out. Come back. Be perfectly honest, brutally honest. And he'll make movies, and he'll do stand-up specials. I'm dying to see that movie.

Somebody's got to have a copy of the movie. I'm sure it'll be palatable. And he, yeah, anyhow. Louis could release it out. He probably should. He should find a smart way of letting it out. I think, you know, my manager made this point, which is very good. If you were all about the money, if you're a talent manager right now,

what's his name? Dave Becky just dropped him. Louis C.K. is like a stock that just crashed. If you're a smart manager that's just about the money. Say it, Dan. Smart Jewel. Go ahead. Pick which sign Louis C.K. tomorrow because this stock may not come back to where it was,

but rest assured, this stock will rise and rise significantly. That is such a good observation. I think we should end on that. Hear, hear. Brendan, Veronica, Mehran. Thank you. Why are you leaving so fast? I have a spot.

Me too. Kristen, we're very happy to have you back. Dan, thank you very much, everybody. Good night. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. very much everybody good night thank you thank you Bye.