Michael Malice: Thanksgiving Pirate Special | Lex Fridman Podcast #402

What's your opinion on my bird here, Mr. Parrot?

It's a macaw. Scarlet macaw. What? It is a scarlet macaw.

Oh, you know birds.

Yeah. And that's actually not life sized.

Are you saying he's not real?

I'm saying it's not to scale.

Okay, but he's real.

Are we doing that Monty Python sketch?

Everything is a Monty Python sketch.

I don't think Monty Python's funny. And you don't at all, like, not.

That explains so much, does it?

What does it explain?

What do you think is funny?

You're not answering that question. It's pretty funny.

Yeah.

What?

What? What do you think is funny? Having a mentis shrimp?

No.

Do you think Big Lebowski is funny?

Oh, God, no.

This is getting worse and worse. The following is a conversation with Michael Malice, anarchist and and author of Dear Reader, the New Right the Anarchist Handbook, the White Pill. And he is the host of the podcast. You're welcome. This is a Thanksgiving special of the pirate and oceangoing variety. So once again, let me say thank you for listening today and for being part of this wild journey with me. This is the Lex Friedman podcast to support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here's Michael Malice.

The box.

Yeah. I'm wondering what's in it.

There's something in that box of exquisite beauty, both literally and in what it symbolizes and why it is here.

Given the kind of human being you are, I'm terrified at what you find beautiful.

That's a good point. You kind of hit me with the curveball.

Yeah.

Like, for me, the most beautiful, like, wildlife are what I call God's mistakes.

Yeah.

Because my friend came up with that term where she's like, you know, God made these disgusting animals, just threw in the bottom of the ocean. He's like, no one's ever gonna see this.

Yeah, you. You commented on Twitter about some creature, like a rainbow type creature.

The peacock, mantis, shrimp. Yeah.

It's beautiful.

It's horrific, though. So it has, I think, eight legs, six arms, two punching claws or spearing claws, depending on the genus. Two eyes, two antennae, two ear flaps. I don't know what they do. And its punch can be as strong as a bullet. And the other type with the spears, divers call them thumb splitters because if you stick your finger near it, it'll cut your thumb down to the bone. So I had one as a pet. All night, I would hear it banging on the PVC pipe. And I've got to tell you, they have the best eyesight of any animal because they see in, like, seven different ways. And when you make eye contact with this thing, it's. It's just absolutely terrifying. But you can eat them as sushi. They call them sea centipedes, but they're colorful and beautiful. That species is. Yeah.

What was it like having one as a pet, and why did you do it?

Well, when you have a species that's that unique and that much of an outlier, you know, growing up reading these books, watching these shows, I found this stuff so much more fascinating than, like, space, which is, you know, dead. So to be able to have this specimen in your house and just observe its behavior is just. Just like, an amazing thing.

Why'd you get rid of it?

I didn't have, I guess, the right minerals in the mix. It died. It had a problem molting once. Yeah, they couldn't molt correctly.

Wow. You miss it. Think about it still.

I do think about it. To be honest, I still have a pair of its cl. Punching appendages from when it molted.

What pet animal in your life do you miss the most that has been in your life that you think about?

I've never had cats or dogs growing up or anything like that, which, you know, I. Oh, God. My problem is.

There we go.

If I like something, I will go down a rabbit hole.

Yeah.

So I know if I got one tattoo, I already know my first five are going to be okay. So I can't do it, because then once I get those five, it's going to be 100, and I'm already too old to be the tattoo guy.

What would be the first tattoo? My face. Would it go on your ass cheeks or where would you put them if it was my face?

If I got your face, it would definitely be on my arm right here.

If you had multiple faces, would you.

Put, like, I think, delts. Right. Shoulders. Different faces and different shoulders.

And when you flex. Yeah. Would you get a dictator?

If you.

If you had to get a dictator, who would you get?

We got the Kim Jong Yel, right? Because I wrote the book on him.

Oh, it's like the plug in your book.

I don't want lugging. It's just like, I have a personal connection to.

Good opener. The conversation. We would be asking, why him? And he'd be like, well, I wrote a book about it.

Well, I'd be like, okay, okay, here, here's. That would be a bad. No, that's not what happens. Okay, here's the thing. What happens when you Write a book about North. Hey, nice to meet you. What is it you do? I'm an author. What kind of books do you write? Well, my last book was on North Korea. 90% of the time. 90. They will then start telling me everything they know about North Korea. And it's like, I don't need. This isn't a quiz, and it's a very poorly understood country. I don't expect you to know anything. You're not on the spot. And. And half what you're saying is not accurate either. It's fine.

How often did they bring up Dennis Rodman?

100%.

100% of the time.

Oh, you see? Do you know Dennis Rodman? Yeah, But I don't understand why. I guess people feel the need to, like, all right, like, now we're talking about this subject, I just got to, you know, drop whatever I can talk about. It's usually a small amount. And there's this thing in the culture which I hate, that everyone have to have an opinion on everything. And it's like, it's okay to be like, yeah, I don't know anything about that. Tell me more. You know, there's lots of things I don't know anything about.

What's your opinion on my bird here, Mr. Parrot?

It's a macaw. Scarlet macaw. What? It is a scarlet macaw.

Oh, you know birds.

Yeah. And that's actually not life sized.

Are you saying he's not real?

I was saying it's not to scale.

Okay, but he's real.

Are we doing that Monty Python sketch?

Everything is a Monty Python sketch.

I don't think Monty Python's funny. You don't? At all?

Like, not that explains so much, does it?

What does it explain?

What do you think is funny?

You're not answering that question is pretty funny.

Yeah. What do you think is funny? Having a mantis shrimp?

No.

You think Big Lebowski is funny?

Oh, God, no.

Although this is getting worse and worse, to be fair. Yep.

I only tried to watch Big Lebowski after it's been part of the culture for many years to the point where every single line has been quoted incessantly by the most annoying frat bros ever.

Yeah.

So I kind of have been poisoned to be able to appreciate it.

Right.

So maybe if I'd seen it when it came out before it became a thing, I would have enjoyed it. I couldn't get through it. Like, I couldn't get through 20 minutes.

Is that how you feel about Schindler's List? Well, it's so Much easier for me to stare at you when you have sunglasses on.

I didn't think you'd be the one making Holocaust jokes today. And yet here we are.

And cut. Scene. I actually have, like, no trouble making eye contact with you when you're wearing shades.

Yes. Because you're a robot.

Two copies of Myself.

Yeah. Oh, you're seeing yourself in them.

Mm. Okay, cool.

Yeah.

I'm having a conversation with myself. It's not your fault, Lex.

They made you like this. You were just a good little Roman in St. Petersburg.

I could see Mr. Parrot a little bit, too.

But what do you find funny? Come on, let's. This is an interesting subject.

Well, I find mighty Python. I find absurdity funny.

Yes. I find absurdity funny. I think that's the thing when people come at me, and maybe this is an Eastern European thing.

Yeah.

When they're like, how can you find this, like, very dark subject funny? It's like, well, the humor. First of all, the humor is that you're making fun of something that's dark. So already it's absurd. Like, it's completely inappropriate. Second, just psychologically, you know, Joan Rivers said that, Winston Churchill said. I don't know if it's true, that when you make people laugh, you're giving them a little vacation. And I was just thinking about this the other day, how when I die, if I want my funeral to be a roast.

Yeah.

It doesn't help me that everyone's sad. If I brought people happiness or joy in life, whatever, I want to keep doing that in death. Your sadness doesn't help me. I know you can't help it, but tell stories how it made you laugh, make fun of me, make me the punching bag, even literally take me out of that coffin and beat the. I don't. Make me a pinata. I don't care. So I think. And it's. I. I don't understand. Well, I do understand, but it's sad for me when people are like, you know, this isn't funny. That isn't funny. I feel the way I look at humor is the way it's like a chef. Right. It's pretty easy to make bacon taste good, but some of these really obscure ingredients to make it palatable, that takes skill. So if you're dealing with a subject that is very emotional or intense and you can make people laugh, then that takes skill, and that's the relief for them.

Yeah. It's all about timing.

Yeah.

Yeah.

What's the difference? You want to hear one of my jokes?

Is it a pirate?

Joke.

Because that's the only. That's the only kind I accept today. But go ahead. It doesn't have to be a pirate joke this one time.

Do you know who Leah Thomas is?

Yeah.

What's the difference between Leah Thomas and Hitler?

What?

Leah Thomas knows how to finish a race.

Very nice. Very nice.

Did I just get the gold medal?

Good job. Why does it take pirates forever to get through the Alphabet?

Why?

Because they spent years at sea.

Oh. I thought it was gonna be an ARR joke. That's a good one. I like that. Yeah. When I was in North Korea.

Oh, you know, Dennis Rodman. It's a callback.

By the way, the thing that is very heartbreaking about the North Korean situation is that they have a great sense of humor. It would be a lot easier if these were, like, robots or drones. They have big personalities, big sense of humor. And that made it much harder to leave and interact with these people because it's. I mean, there's nothing more human and universal than laughter, and laughter is free.

Are you saying there's humor even amongst the people that have most of their freedoms taken away?

Especially, I mean, again, we're from the Soviet Union. I mean, Russian humor is a thing, because there's nothing you can. If you can't have food or nice things, at least you can have joy and make each other laugh. I think about it all the time, and I think about my guide all the time. It's been, what, 2012. So it's been 11 years since I've been there, and she's still there, and everyone I've seen is still there. They just recently electrified the border, so you can't even. Even the few people who are escaping can't do it anymore.

But that's interesting that they still have a sense of humor. I attribute the Soviet Union for having that because of the, like, really deep education system, like, you. You got to read a lot of literature.

Okay.

And because of that, you get to kind of learn about the. The cruelty, the injustices, the absurdity of the world.

Right.

As long as the writing is not about the current regime.

Yeah. But I think if you look at, like, African Americans, Jewish Americans, gay Americans, they are all disproportionate in terms of attributing to comedy. It's not because these groups have some kind of, you know, magic to them. It's that when you are on the outside looking in a. You're gonna have different perspective than the people who are in the middle of the bell curve. But also when you don't have anything to lose. At the very least, you can make each other laugh and find happiness that way. So, you know, that is something that I think is an important thing to recognize.

So what do you find funny? What makes you giggle? Like, in the most joyful of ways? The suffering of others.

I mean, there are YouTube videos of, like, fat people falling down, and they're. They're really funny.

There's two kinds of people in this world. Those that laugh at those videos and those that don't.

No. And those that are in them. My friend Jesse just told me a great Norm MacDonald joke, and this is a good litmus test joke, because he says a certain group of people lose their minds, and a certain group of people just stare at you. And he goes, this kind of. So I'll tell you the joke. This is Norm MacDonald guy walks into a bar, and he sees someone at the bar who has a big pumpkin for a head. And the guy's like, dude, what happened to you? He goes, ugh, you never believe this. I got one of those genie lamps and this genie. He's like, well, what happened? He goes, well, the first wish, you know, I wish for $100 million. He's like, yeah, you got. He goes, yeah. He goes, in my bank account. Feels fine. He goes, all right, well, the second wish. I wish to have sex with as many beautiful women as I wanted. He goes, did that happen? Goes, yeah, it was amazing. He goes, then what? Well, I wish for a giant pumpkin head.

Yeah.

So there's a certain mindset that will just be staring at the screen, and that is. I mean, there's so many levels why that's funny, at least to me. And I. I just love that kind of.

Well, Norm McDonald is like, just. I watch his videos all the time. He's. He's a guy that definitely makes me giggle, and he's one of the people that makes me giggle for reasons I don't quite understand.

Did you ever see him with Carrot Top on Conan o'? Brien?

No.

Of making fun of Carrot Top?

No.

He. This is probably the best talk show clip of all time. He's on with Courtney Thorne Smith. She was on Melrose Place and Con. O' Brien's the host, and Courtney's talking about how she's going to be an upcoming movie with Carrot Top. And Conan is like, oh, what's it gonna be called? And she's like, doesn't have a title yet. And Norman goes, oh, I know. It should be called Box Office Poisoned. And they're all laughing, and she's like, no, no, no. Like, the working title is chairman of the board. And Conan goes, do something with that smart ass. And Norm goes, yeah, bored is spelled B O R E D. And they all just completely lost it.

There's something about him with words spoken out of his mouth, with the way he, like, turns his head and looks at the camera.

I think he is one of those rare comedians who you really feel like he's talking to you directly.

Yeah.

He feels like he's winking at you in the audience and he's like, can you. Can you believe I'm doing this? Like, it's like he almost. He feels like he's. I don't want to say imposter, but like, he's more a member of the audience than he is a member of the people on the stage.

Yeah, it feels like he's on our side.

Yes.

Yeah, whatever the hell our means.

You know, Roseanne got him his first job, man.

Roseanne, you and her been hanging out.

I got it. Oh, my God. Talk about Thanksgiving. When you are talking to Roseanne Barr and making eye contact with this person, it is. I can't even describe it. It's just like, holy crap. Roseanne Barr's talking to me. She is. I've said this to her face, pathologically funny. Like, it does not turn off. And you're sitting there and you're like, holy crap. And when you make her laugh, which is that laugh that's in the theme song of her show, you feel like, okay, I did a mitzvah. I did something good. And right in the world that I made Roseanne Barr laugh. And it's also really funny because. And she's gonna hate this because I tell her she's adorable. She doesn't like that. She's little. You think of Roseanne Barr as this, like, force of nature, like a tsunami. She's like, five, three, I'd say, like, maybe 130, like. And she's. And she puts on the sunglasses. You think this little Jewish lady, you'd never know. This is one of the most epic performers of all time. She lives near here now, so it's just so much fun talking to her. There's an old satirical magazine in the, I think, like, early 2000s called he written by Jews. And she dressed up as Hitler for one of the photo shoots. And she was baking little men in the oven. I got. I found on ebay. I want her to sign it to Michael. It should have been you, but she signed it to Michael. You're one smart cookie. And now it hangs. Love, Mom, Roseanne Barr. And I call her Mom. And it hangs over my desk because have her, like, good domestic goddess energy flowing at me. What?

What do you find? What else? So, Norm MacDonald, Norman.

My favorite comedian is.

We agree on something.

My favorite comedian of all time is Neil Hamburger. So Neil Hamburger, I don't know if I'm ruining the bit. He's a character performed by this guy named Greg Turkington. So he comes out in a tuxedo, big eyeglasses, holding three glasses of water, coughing into the mic. And I remember I saw him once in la. And the girl ahead of me at the table ahead of me was with her boyfriend, this basic chick, pumpkin spice. She turns to him and she goes, what is this? And I remember the first time he was on Jimmy Kimmel and he tells one of his jokes and he was like, why does ET Like Reese's Pieces so much? Well, that's what sperm tastes like on his home planet. And like, no one laughs. And he goes, oh, come on, guys, I have cancer. And it just cuts to this Marine in the audience with his arms crossed. So if you know what he's doing, it's just absolutely amazing. He opened for Tenacious D once in somewhere, I think in Ireland or the uk One of those. And they're booing him because his jokes are often not funny. He's like, hey, where did my whore ex wife run off to with that dentist she's shacking up with? I don't know. But when I see her in court next month, Alaska. So they're booing and he goes, all right, do you guys want me to bring out Tenacious D? They're like, yeah. Do you want to see your heroes of mine? Tenacious D? Yeah. Come on, let me hear it. Do you want to see Tenacious D?

Yeah.

He goes, all right, if I tell this next joke and you don't boo me, I'll bring out Tenacious D. And it's like I'm trying to think of one that's not too self.

Censorship is never good, okay?

He goes, can we agree that George Bush is the worst president America has ever had? Everyone claps. He goes, which makes it all the stranger that his son, George W. Bush was in fact the best.

I take it back on the self. Sons of shit.

So two people laugh and he goes, oh, that's amazing. I guess I'll do an encore. And he did 10 more minutes. It was just. Just like, I love him so much.

It's interesting. They opened for Tenacious D. Jack Black That's a comedic genius of a different kind.

Oh, yeah. And he was in one of my favorite movies. Jesus, son. It's this little indie movie. He did a great turn in that. He's really underrated as an actor. He's got a lot of range. Like, I know they kind of. Kind of get types cast as this kind of one specific type, but he's really, really talented.

But also just like the pure joy.

Yes. He's clearly having fun.

Okay, it is Thanksgiving. So in tradition, following tradition, what are you thankful for, Michael?

I got a world. Do you have a list, too?

No, not really.

Really?

It's up in here.

Oh. I mean, but you have several things you're thankful for. Yes. Okay.

Yes.

One of the things I.

My list comes from the heart. I don't have to write anything down.

Well, I don't have written down.

Okay.

One of the things that I'm most thankful for. This is a common answer, but I can back it up. Is my family. Because my nephew Lucas is now six years old, and he. When kids have a sense of humor, it's like, just miraculous. So he stole my sister's phone. His mom figured out that grandma is listed as mom in the phone. And he calls her up and he's like, michael's in the hospital. He's really sick. He didn't want to tell you. And she's freaking out. He goes, prank. So I took him. Dinesh d' Souza just released a movie called Police State, which is actually really good. Highly recommended. I was surprised how much I liked it because he wasn't going. Republicans good, Democrats bad. It was just about authoritarianism. And he had a movie premiere at Mar A Lago. So I'm like, I got to bring Lucas to Mar a Lago. So Lucas is. I'm like, we're going to the president's house. He's like, oh, the White House. And I'm like, no. Like a former president goes, oh, Abe Lincoln. And I'm like, okay, kid logic. Like, he's. He's giving logical answers. This is kind of like I. You have to. You have to program it. It's using logic correctly.

You should have told him, as a president, that's second to only Abe Lincoln in terms of.

Yeah, he went up to all the women in their ball gown, you know, evening gowns. And he goes, you're so beautiful. Were you born as a girl? So when you have this six year old asking you this, it was really, really fun. So that is a great joy to have a nephew. And I have Another one, Zach, who's coming up in age, and he's starting to talk now. That is really, really fun.

Getting to watch them, you know, find out about the world for the first time.

And also training them like that. He loves being funny and having fun.

You're his audience, in a sense. Yeah. But as you giggle and I give.

Him we're prank bros, it gives me a high five. My family, and this is one you talk about what I find funny. These are things that actually enraged me when people, and this is such a wasp thing, don't just go with the joke, or they're like, I don't get it, or they don't understand to just go with it. I was in the car with my sister when she was like 10, 12, whatever. She's much younger than me. She's like 12 years younger. And there's this species of squid, by the way, which is asymmetric. One of its eyes is very much bigger than the other because it swims horizontally. And so one's looking up, one's looking down where there's more light. Shout out. If you want to learn more about squids, go to octonation.com octonation Shout out. Shout out to Warren.

There's a lot of fascinating stuff, Octonation on Instagram.

Yes. I was in the car with my sister. She's like 10 or 20.

Me as a pirate. I'm sorry for the rude interruptions. I appreciate that account especially.

Yeah, it's a great. Yeah.

These jokes and thoughts are coming to me at a like a 10 second delay, so I apologize. Anyway, you were telling about the symmetrical. All right. So I told my friends, you need help? No, the age is getting to you.

I was.

Your skin is showing it. It's getting dark.

I told my sister, I go, when you were born, one of your eyes was bigger than the other and you had to have surgery to fix it. So she turns, she's like, mom. And my mom goes, honey, the important thing is that you're beautiful now. That's all. It's like, what's the big deal? It was just a little surgery. And my sister's like, all right. Calls Grandma. And grandma goes, she goes, michael said that when I was born, one of the eyes, she goes, why is he telling you this now? It's not a big deal. So the fact that everyone went with this, I was so impressed. I was like, this is a quality family in this very specific regard.

Yeah.

Does your family have a sense of humor?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, Soviet culture There's, like, a dark sense of humor.

Very much.

There's wordplay. Wordplay? Yeah. Yeah. Especially the Russian language allows for some, like, hilarity to it. There's also culture of, like, poetry and, like, my dad. My mom, too, but they. They remember a lot of lines from books and poems, so there's just. You can do a lot of fascinating references that add to the humor and the richness of the.

I feel like that's a very Russian thing. Like, at a party or maybe at a bar or something. I don't know where you'd meet people. These are such great.

I go out.

I meant in Russia. I meant these would be such good icebreakers. Right. You go up to someone goes, hey, did you hear this one? No anecdote. And you just tell him some little story.

Did you say icebreakers? Because it's cold in Russia. I'm here all night.

That's. You never leave, literally. So I feel like that's a thing. Yeah. And that's not a thing in America.

You mean, like, witty banter?

No. Meaning you go up to stranger and, like, that's your icebreaker. You tell him this little. Little joke. And since everyone kind of has the same sensibilities, right away, you guys are chatting. I don't think that's a thing here.

Yeah.

Thing here. It's more small talk, which drives me crazy.

So what else are you thankful for?

Well, what do I. What's something you're thankful for?

Well, you went with family. I'm definitely thankful for family.

Okay.

Yeah.

How, if I may ask, how did they react to you? Like, you're sitting down with Elon. You're sitting. Now Netanyahu. You sit down with all these, like, big. With Kanye, all these big names. Are they expressing that they're proud of you, or is it more like, why haven't you talked to this person more?

Michael Malice, please.

The People's choice.

Yeah. Yeah. They're very proud. They've been very.

They're very.

I mean, but they get argumentative when we just. They're just like a regular human being with whom I'm close, and we just argue about stuff. They're not. Maybe not enough showed up being proud of. But that. That part is just the nature of our relationship. It's also Soviet parents.

Yeah. I don't talk to my dad. That's one of the reasons. Because there's never, ever any good job. And at a certain point, it's like, why am I trying to search for approval from someone? I'm never getting at it. For and from who. It wouldn't mean anything at this point anyway.

Well, that's interesting. I mean, there's a journey like that for a lot of people with their father or with their mother. Like, they're always trying to find approval.

Right.

And that's life for a lot of people. Yeah, that's. That's a really big part of the human condition, is that relationship you have with your father, with your mother. I don't know. It's a beautiful thing. So it's whether it's been a rough childhood or beautiful one, all of it, that's who you are. Like that. The relationship, especially early on in your life with your father, with your mother, is, like, extremely formative.

Yeah. So my dad taught me a lot of things at a young age that I'm very, very grateful for. He was. He's extremely intelligent, very flawed, and that's fine. We all are, except for me. And it's the kind of things that when you learn things at a right age. And this is one of the things I like about being older, is that when I'm friends. Much older, Much older, but much, much older. When I have friends who are younger, it's very easy for me to keep them from making the mistakes I did. So at least this is something I'm getting out of it. Is that okay? I can't fix these mistakes, but it just takes me 30 seconds and I can pull you back from making the mistake. So he's taught me a lot as a kid. He really encouraged me very much to. He's a very good sense of humor and also very bad in some ways. Dad jokes, but also really funny jokes. But also this love of learning, I got that from him. And, I mean, I have got, literally right now, 98 books on my shelf to read. It's just a life that makes me. I remember I had a friend, and she ran into someone she went to high school with, and he stopped on the train and he's like, yo, you're not in college. You need to read books anymore. And I was just like, horrified to hear this.

Yeah, yeah, boy, don't I know it.

I mean. I mean, I. You do laugh, but, like, I. When you got. There's a lot of things I don't understand. When you got heat for, like, I want to read the Western classics. To me, that. That might have been like the Internet at its absolute worst.

I think there's just a cynical perspective. You can take that there. This is such a simple celebration of a thing that there must be something behind It. I think the Internet, for good and bad, is just skeptical. Like, what's behind this?

My hero, Albert Camus. And if there's one thing I would want to fight, it's cynicism. Yeah, because it's such a giving up. It's such. Everything sucks. This sucks. That sucks. This sucks. Most things suck. Most standard comedians suck. Most movies suck. All podcasts suck. But it doesn't matter.

Especially yours.

Especially mine. It's. It's unwatchable. You're welcome.

You can't even spell it correctly, but.

The stuff that's good is what matters. Who cares if 90% of movies are terrible? They're the ones that change your life. The books, the people, the comedians, the.

Shows, the music, and even the terrible things have good moments. Beautiful moments.

Some, not all.

Your podcast being an example of not all. I've literally just. I keep listening for something good. Something good.

In all fairness, none of my guests have anything to offer that's not on me. I try.

Yeah. Well, I wish you'd talk a little less in your podcast. It's a little excessive. I only listen for the underwear commercials.

Sheathunderwear.com probably got malice.

I think you did this. I haven't seen you do it in a while, but this kind of commentary on a debate or. I think it was with Rand. Like an Ayn Rand debate or something.

Oh, yeah. Malice at the Movies. I watched the video and I broke it down.

That was really great. I wish you did that more.

I've. I haven't done live streaming in a long time. I. It was something I was doing a lot in New York, especially during COVID I feel that. I don't know. I'm having. I got so many projects on the plate. I'm. Oh, this is something else I'm thankful for. This is something I'm very, very thankful for. And I'm going to announce it here.

Coming out of the closet. Finally go. Who's the lucky guy?

You're the one in.

Dragons out. Guns out.

He makes me. He makes me call him Sex Freedman.

You like it?

So I didn't say. Didn't even imply that when I in. As you probably know, as you know, but as many people watching this also know, Harvey Pekar, who had the comic book series American Splendor, was the subject of the movie American Splendor. He wrote a graphic novel about me in 2006 called Ego and Hubris, which goes for like $150 on eBay. It's not worth it. Just download it. And I met Harvey because I wrote this screenplay about this band from the 80s called Rubber Rodeo. It's a real band. And the keyboardist, Gary Lieb, who passed away, rest in peace. Gary introduced me to Harvey because he did the animation for the movie. And this script's been in my desk for over 20 years. And I realized, thanks to my buddy Eric July, who has some huge success with his comics, I could just produce this as a graphic novel. So I've got an artist, we're getting it together. So I'm going to make it happen finally. And it's some of the best writing I've ever done. I'm really proud of the story. It's kind of ironic reading it now because when you're a writer, obviously different books, you put different aspects of yourself into them. Right. And this story is very, very dark because basically they did all the right things and they went nowhere. Right. What I realized was, reading it now, that all these fears I had over 20 years ago about what if I'm not going to make it? What if I'm doing all the hard work and it's still not enough? Now it's been disproven because I can at least pay my rent.

Do you feel like you've made it? So you said you could pay your rent.

I feel that to make it is if you can pay your. If you don't have to have a boss. And you know how I really felt like I made it. This is going to sound like a joke, and it's not. This is being an immigrant. I own, as you know, Margaret Thatcher's bookcases.

Yes.

So to me, as an immigrant, to have her bookcases in my house, I've made it. You're right.

It's not a joke.

There's nothing funny about it at all. Time to get serious.

Oh, nice. Oh, now I'm more nervous and aroused. So what else are you thankful for? So we're both thankful for family.

You, I mean, I'm. The fact that I can still get it up. What's that?

Nothing. Go ahead.

I think as an author, to be able to write what you want and have enough an audience that it covers your living, that's as good as it gets as an author, almost. You don't need to be Stephen King or some legend. It's like, you know, there's lots of standups who aren't, like, world famous, but they have perfectly good living. They do their gig, they do what they love. I. I feel very, very blessed. You must be thankful for your career.

Yeah, yeah. Career wise. But Like, I think the best part about it is just meeting, making friends with people I admire. Okay, quite honestly, just friends. I, you know, the people have gotten to know me. I hide from the world sometimes. I hit some low points, especially with this new. All the new experiences and just the people that have been there for me and haven't given up on me.

You know, there's days, and I'm sure you've had this also, where, like, I literally don't speak to someone the whole day. And in certain times of my life, it's really. I. I remember very vividly. I. I was in DC in 97. I was an intern. And that summer, DC closes down on the weekends. And I remember those weekends when, like, I got off the phone with, like, the third person. I knew there was no possibility anyone was going to call and what that felt like. And it was dark and it was bad. So I remember those feelings of loneliness, like, a lot.

I still feel alone like that sometimes. You don't feel. You don't feel alone.

Not anymore.

What's the reason you think?

I. Because there's like, I have a lot of people who I care about, who care about me. I mean, the thing about moving to Austin is I forgot how lonely New York got because it was like one after another, I lost everybody. And a certain. And then you start losing the places you go to. And then it was just like, holy crap. I'm very isolated. And here in Austin, there's not as much to do, obviously, as in New York, but there's a lot of people here. More people are coming all the time. So if I ever want to, like, hang out with someone, you know, I've got a long list. And these are people who I've known for a very long time, people who know me quite well. So I could be myself. My awful, awful, awful, awful, awful self. And that is something I don't take lightly.

Now you move to Texas, it's going to secede.

Yeah.

It's just a very.

Do you know what happened with that?

No, I forgot.

The guys in the aim and it's probably for the best. Monday. On Monday, a guy in the Texas legislature introduces a bill to have it on the referendum. To have a referendum for Texas to declare its independence. Tuesday, I'm on Rogan. Me and him discuss it. I give it national attention. It was also really funny because a lot of people, like these people have been in Texas five minutes, blah, blah. I go to the Texas legislature, meet with the guy, have a nice conversation. Month or two later, unanimous. I Think he gets voted kicked out of Congress because he got an intern drunk and was inappropriate with her. And at least it was a girl in this case. But. Yeah. So it's like that was my little Texas independence moment.

Oh, it didn't go anywhere.

It did not go anywhere.

Wow.

But it's still part of the platform, the Texas Republican Party. Yeah.

It's fascinating that history is probably laden with stories like this of failed revolutionaries. We celebrate the heroes, but then there's the losers like myself. Yeah.

Yeah.

And we're gonna mark that one as a failure and edit it out and moving on. So thankful. Yeah. Friendships.

Right.

But by the way, I want to say, just to you, I'm thankful in this lonely moments for people who write books. I've been listening to audiobooks a lot and reading a lot. I really like audiobooks, actually. And just like, I don't know, I can just name random person. Serhi Plo. He's a historian. I'm reading on the.

Wait, I read him. What do you.

What I just see. He written a book most recently about the Russia, Ukraine War.

He wrote another one that I read. Didn't he write Empires? I think the Fall of the Soviet Union or something like that?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It was very, very good.

He's great.

I used him as a resource for the white pill.

He's objective while still having emotion and feeling to it. Like he has a bias. That's fine, but without. A lot of times, when you write a story that involves Putin, people are really ideological.

Yeah.

They don't really, like, they don't write with the calmness and the clarity and the rigor of history. There's emotion in it. Like, there's almost a virtue signaling.

Yeah.

And he doesn't have that, even though he is Ukrainian and is very strong opinions on the matter. Anyway, there's people like that. And he's done incredible job researching a recent event. Like he says, I was looking at everything that's been written about the war in Ukraine and realizing, you know, the old Churchill line that historians are the worst ones to write about current events, except everybody else. And so he's like, I might as well just write about this war. And he does an exceptional job summarizing day by day, the details of this. This war anyway. So I'm just grateful for a guy like that.

So for me, there's. I'll name some historians I love. Arthur Herrmann. Victor Sebastian is probably my favorite. David Petrusha, P I E T R U S Z A. When you are a historian and I tried to do this to some degree in the White pill as much as I could, but, yeah, when you take data and you make it read like a novel, this. So you're learning about who we are as people, what had happened. But also it's entertaining and readable. That, to me, is like the Acme of writing, and I have so much admiration.

What does Acme mean?

Top.

Okay.

Zenith.

Zenith.

Okay.

This is what writers do. They just come up with these incredibly sophisticated words. I'm impressed.

Well, Acme.

You could have just said the best of writing.

Acme is also the company in, like, Bugs Bunny and Wiley Coyote. So is Acme. You know, Acme.

Yeah, yeah.

Like Acme bombs when they are that good. It's. It's just. It just. It leaves me in awe.

It's just.

Ron Charnow is another one who. He wrote the Hamilton biography.

Oh, nice. Oh, I have a lot of favorite historians about the whole time period of World War II. William Shire, people that lived during it especially. I really like those accounts. Obviously, Soldier Nitson's. He's not a historian, but his accounts are sure fascinating. You actually. How much do you talk about Soldier Nansen? Never. Not much.

Right.

Why not?

I feel like I wanted to. I, I. There's something I could add to him.

He is the Michael Malice of the previous century.

No, he's talented, charismatic, and skilled. So he's not the Michael Malice. Yeah. I feel like I didn't read Gulag Archipelago for the White Pill.

You didn't?

I didn't, no. I got a lot of it from Anne Applebaum, who's a very controversial figure. Her history books on the Soviet Union, I think, are superb. But she's also accused of being very much like a neocon and being a warmonger in contemporary times.

Oh, I see.

And I think comparisons between Putin and Stalin, although there is a Venn diagram, I think, are a bit much because I think it's very hard to claim that if Putin conquered Ukraine, that there'd be a genocide. I don't think that's a very hard.

Argument to make in these tense times. Even the comparisons of what's going on in Israel on either side, comparisons to the Holocaust are also troubling in this way.

Yes. And I also don't like how that I got in trouble. There was some literal demon who works at the Atlantic, as opposed to a regular demon, as opposed to figurative demon.

I didn't know they employed demons.

They exclusively employ demons at the Atlantic, and he was giving me crap. This a couple years ago on Twitter, because I didn't think it's appropriate to refer to George Soros as a Holocaust survivor. And I'm like, listen, if you want to put him in the same context as Anne Frank, knock yourself out. But I think that's so completely disingenuous and frankly, repulsive to me morally, to equivocate between figures like that. And also to claim that anyone who is a billionaire, who is, including Elon, including Sheldon Adelson, there's no shortage of these people. If you want to use your extreme wealth used to influence politics, you have to be up for criticism and to protect people. Bill Gates to protecting these people from criticism, just on the base of their identity is deranged to me.

But also the Holocaust as a historical event and the atrocities within it are just singular in history. And so comparing them, what's the utility?

Right. You're just. You're just basically trying to take this brand. I'm using that term, you know, in a very specific way. And latch. Like when they say climate denial, no one's denying climate exists. So you're just trying to go off of Holocaust denial. I think it's shameless and I think it's.

It's gross and it cheapens everything.

Yeah.

There's deep, important lessons about the Holocaust.

Yes.

To me, the lessons are about how extreme it can get and how fast.

Yeah.

And how fast.

That's the one. So, you know, people ask, oh, are humans basically good? Are they basically evil? I always say they're basically animals. And I think people are. Most people are almost fundamentally deranged. And that there's basically this veneer of civilization and decency. And when shit hits the fan and we see this over and over, they do things that would have been completely unthinkable even to themselves five years ago.

Most people are fundamentally deranged with a veneer of civility.

There's a show called.

I think I disagree with that.

What's the show called? I'm having Alzheimer's because of the advanced.

Age, the skin care.

There's a show called I think you should leave. It's a sketch comedy. You should leave.

Okay, sorry.

It's a sketch comedy show. And he captures these great. How's your hair, princess? He captures these great moments of just the, like. Just the very thin veneer of normalcy and just the craziness that's so frequently lurking underneath. Another great example of this, when this is dealing with people who are literally crazy. Have you ever seen the show Hoarders? So every episode of Hoarders Every. There's two, usually two people in every episode. But every episode has the same plot line. Veneer of normalcy. Veneer of normalcy. Veneer of normalcy. Slight expression of concern. Full blunt derangement. And it always follows that exact pattern.

Yeah. I don't know. I think the deep ocean of the human mind is good. Like, there's a longing to be good to others.

I have seen literally no evidence of this. And I know everything's the deep ocean with you people, but, like.

What do you mean? You people?

Pirates. Oh, I don't see it. You. You.

That Mr. Parrot. He's an antisemite.

No.

That's not nice to say in front of such a large audience. You're embarrassing me, Mr. Parrot.

Lex, you have.

Mr. Parrot.

You. You have.

He's. He's a run of the mill troll and barely an intellectual. That's not nice to say. That's not true.

We talked about this.

You have to see the good in people.

You have seen personally. Yeah. How quickly and easily it is for human beings to form out groups.

Yeah.

And to just read others, just as I just did a minute ago with the Atlantic. Completely out of the human race. And that happens constantly and very easily. Humans are tribal beings, so that does not. I don't see how that's compatible with this essential desire to do good.

No. I think it's like in 1984, the two minutes of hate. There is a part of humans that wants to be tribal.

Yeah.

And wants to direct, get angry and hate.