Mehdi Hasan: The Freedom to Speak

(upbeat music) - Shantovandam, I mean, come on, he's not Jason Stade. - Whoa, yeah, yeah, yeah. - Are you kidding me? - Yo, one JCVD versus Jason Stade. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. - First of all, say that we kick his ass. - My friend, okay, let me start by saying this. - You're stupid. (laughing) - Secondly, secondly. Jean-Claude Van Dam, my friend. - You. - I grew up watching Jean-Claude Van Dam. - You have the memory of a goldfish. - No, I didn't, I can't really have fun. - Yeah, bloodsport. - Yeah, bloodsport. - There is no world. - Double impact. - There is no world where you can make a statement as it would be a close fight. - Yes, would it be a tough fight. - Time cop. - My friend, there is no world. There's no scenario you watch more JCVD films than I have. I watch him now at the B-shit that goes straight to streaming where he's like an old assassin retired. I watch that shit too. I watch all of this stuff. - What does that mean? - In what world? - In what world are you gonna bring? - Yeah, what does that have to do with it? - Yeah. - I don't know. - Oh, he has a gun now, 'cause he can't do split some kick anymore. - 'Cause you said he's old and you did this to your hands. - I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. - You have to do this, I don't know. - What is this? - Jason's day, Jason's day, what world? - No, what world are you talking about? - You think this Belgian dancer is gonna take out? - You think this British, you bring this British divoter? - You think this British divoter is gonna beat kickboxer. - What cheesy life life? - What are you talking about? What are you talking about? - Hey, this guy is. - He sure is, bro. - Say it. - Do you not talk, Paul? - Ah, I mean, you're playing games, you. - Have you seen Universal Soldier? - My men have watched all of these of the only movies we've had in South Africa. - I think Dolph Lundgren would have kicked John Colveldub's. - Wait, man, that's a tough one. - But that's a tough one. - Yeah, but I'll give you Lundgren. - Yeah, but I'm saying that I won't give you Van Dam. - What's the. what's the language rules on this shirt? - You speak the language, you speak. - Okay. - How many languages do you speak? - What enough? - What's the half, Urdu? - Oh, okay, all right. We are known as the Urdu swearing podcast. - I don't know, I don't know, are you a. But you did your famous India Pakistan, dodgy accent. That was on every Indian WhatsApp group I was on. - I got that clip, don't worry, I remember it well. - He did like a bully at the middle, he did like a bully. - Oh yeah. - It was at the middle of the world. - What did you do? - God flamed for that. - He did like in the middle of the world, he did like a bully with break out of the soldiers. He like mocked Indian bucks, study soldiers doing this. - No, no, no, no, no, I didn't, I didn't mock the media. - It was, I can't remember this. - Come on, media, you are the men of facts. - Not anymore, come on, media. (laughing) - Have an early on set dementia. (laughing) - By the way, I have a heart out of 425, my friend, 'cause I got to catch the train on my wife will kill me. - Let's do it, man. - She's already upset with me. - Let's not make her more upset. - Oh man, why should I upset with you? - 'Cause I'm always traveling. - So I said, I'll be home tonight, eight o'clock. - Did you? - I got a bit of the five o'clock train. - Did you think you would work less or more when you started your own thing? - I thought I would work more, not this much more. - Well, it's insanely more. - Yeah, and I will say congratulations on all of your assessments. - Thank you very much. - I appreciate it, same to you. - Does it feel like a, does it feel like freedom or does it feel like a different kind of burden? - No, no, freedom. - Yeah, always freedom. - I love the freedom. - Did you ever see this for yourself? Have we started? - Yeah, what do you mean? - I love this the weirdest podcast I've ever done. - Yeah, that's what I've been talking about. - What's going on this guy? - You just lulled me into it. - What do you mean? - If I said something outrageous that I wasn't supposed to say, what if I wanted to say some shit? - Say some shit. - Wait, wait, wait, wait, let me understand this. So you, you, you don't know, I'm all buttoned up. - Ready to go. - What would you like to talk about on the video? - Oh, you see now. You see now, MIDI. - You should've been admitted that we were on. - Now we must cut the cameras and then go back to the previous MIDI Hassan. That's not what we're doing here. - Okay. - That's literally not what we're doing here. - What we're doing. - No, we're doing what? - I'm a free man. You see, so be free. - I'm free from corporate slavery, servitude, domination, I get to say whatever I want. I get to do whatever I want. I don't have to look over my shoulder. It is liberating. - What do you think you couldn't say before that you can't say now? - Lots of things, I can say. - Yeah, I could say whatever I want. - But what couldn't you say before? Do you remember a specific thing where you were like, "Oh, damn, I couldn't say this before." - Oh, I think, well, if you know anything about corporate media and you do because you worked in it as well, you know that it doesn't come down as a set of rules. It comes down as kind of, you know, maybe you shouldn't say this or that. I mean, there are obviously rules. - Yeah, yeah. - I went to NBC News, which has a very strong standards about which I respect. - Oh, no, that's different. - Standards is different. - Standards are different. But then there's also, you know, things like, you're not supposed to swear. That's obviously. - Yeah, that means that I can understand that too. - But obviously, if you look at, for example, the New York Times, intercepting a hold of a memo at the early days of the genocide where they were saying, "Don't say occupation. "Don't say apartheid. "Don't say genocide. "This was a guidance to reporters." Like that kind of bullshit. When I set up Zateo in 2024, the first thing I said was, I get to say the G word, the F word, and the R word. Genocide, fascism and racism, which corporate media runs away from. They do, you can't call Donald Trump a racist. You don't know what's in his heart. You can't say it's a genocide, that's a little, that's a little inflammatory, and even though every genocide scholar in the world pretty much now says it's a genocide. So, this kind of crap, you know, fascism. I was one of the first people on MSNBC to say the F word, August 2020. I was sitting in for Chris Hayes. It was the Portland protest, George Floyd protest, and I said, "We need to say fascism." And at the time people, "Oh, this is hyperbolic. "What are you talking about? "He's not Hitler." Now, it's kind of his own team of pretty much, so he's a fascist. - Yeah, but, so here's what I think it is. I understand it. Even though I don't agree with it most of the time. I think what happens is people don't understand that it's something that shifts. It's not something that happens. Does this make sense? Fascism or any of the, so everyone thinks that fascism happens overnight. Everyone thinks that even things like, you know, take it out of politics, being broke or being an alcoholic or be, people think those things just happen overnight, but it's the one thing that leads to the next thing. It's the second drink, the third drink, the fifth drink, two nights a week, three nights a week, four nights a week. So when you say it on night two of the person drinking, alcoholic, people are like, "Nah, matey, matey, matey." Come on, man. We don't use that word because that's hyperbolic. Yes, but the problem is by the time you are using, by the time everyone agrees on the word. - Yes, it's too late. - It's too late. - That's the issue. - So I look at the Palestinians. - Yeah. - Now it's like, "Oh, the majority of genocides call us "say it's a genocide." Every human rights group says it's a genocide. - Yeah. - But prominent Israelis say it's a genocide. And it's like, "Okay, but now 100,000 people are dead." Nyah, who says he wants to go over all of Gaza, et cetera, et cetera. We're in a very different place. Same with the fascism. - By the time everyone agrees it's too late. - Well, fundamentally. - In 2019, I wrote a piece. I was writing for the Incept of the Time. I wrote a piece in, I think March, April of 2019. And I said, "If Donald Trump loses the next election, "he will not accept the result and there will be riots." And people said, "You don't know what they're talking about. "You're a fucking Brit. "You don't know anything about America. "Secret Service will march him out. "That's not how it works. "See, of course he can't try and stay on." And then we saw what happened with the election tonight in January 6th. And now it's like everyone's like, "Oh, well, maybe he'll stay on in 20-20." And now everyone gets it. When there's too late, he's back for a second term. He's crushing his opposition. Now it's like, "Oh yeah, maybe he's a fascist. "Maybe he doesn't respect election results." - You know, I just want to be a dictator. - I just realized that you're a Brit. I don't know why I didn't think of that before. - I'm a British American now. The time I was a Brit. - Yeah, but what I'm saying is I don't even think of you as a Brit. - What? - I think you are-- - No, okay, let me explain. Stop being a hater, mate. I'm trying to explain something to you here. This guy's trying to fight me here, and I'm not trying to fight here. You get what I'm saying, Eugene. - Yeah. - You know sometimes somebody becomes so ubiquitous that you don't think of them as people. - Oh, I think a lot of innocuous. (laughing) - Your ubiquitous is not good. - No, what I mean is like you, someone starts to occupy a space just as themselves and you don't think of them as being from somewhere. Or, because I, and I mean this as a compliment, by the way, I just think of you as Mady Hassan now from the internet. - Yeah, just from the side. - Yeah, stop people's day. - Yeah. - But from the side guys, yeah. I do think of you as the, like when you said now a Brit, I was like, oh, damn. - Yeah. - Away from in the UK. - North London. - Huh. - 12 years ago I left. - Are you a football fan? - I am. - Who's your team? - Liverpool. - Why didn't we start there, Mady? - 'Cause I grew up in the 1980s, where every brown Muslim supported Liverpool. - Why? - Oh, glory hunting. It was the end of a great era. The funny thing is I started supporting Liverpool when they stopped winning everything. - Or they stopped winning when you started supporting them. - Exactly. - But I said this appears more in recently, where he insisted on his show that I congratulate him on asking or winning the Premiership. And I said, you know, I'm used to Liverpool not doing well. Liverpool winning things was an aberration for me. My daughter's a Liverpool fan. Much bigger fan than I am watches every game. I didn't have time to watch football anymore 'cause of my life. But I'm used to it. She's got to enjoy Premier League victories and world class. But I lived through the '90s, where it was very difficult. Very difficult here where Manu and I two were winning everything. So you jumped on a bandwagon and the bandwagon's worst time. Every brown person did. So I'd come on the Mayor of London. - Yeah. - He's a Liverpool fan. - Oh, wow. So this is how I came to, I wonder if this is how Ryan jumped on. Ryan, is this how you jumped on? - Ryan is white. - Why would he jump on when the brown people were jumping in? - Ryan is white. - The brown people always look like. - That's so great that we can all chill in oil. - No, no. We should start building an image of this Ryan guy. - If he's white, he probably joined at the right time. We're brown people come late to everything, right? The DC people, people from the subcontinent. We're late. We're famously late. So I come along in like 1990 and it's like, yeah, it's John Barnes at the end of his career. Ian Rush retiring. Ronnie Rosenthal, Israeli super sub. Wonder what would happen to him today. But, you know, this is this was a period where Muslims [BLANK_AUDIO] Liverpool and we still do and but some of us you know my daughter's lucky as I but this season not so lucky Yeah, but I mean I mean Liverpool we are we were still the champions until recently is the thing I always you know I have to be reminded of Arsenal won Eugene. Why do you want me to stay it? Wait. What did they win? You know it's a gene You know it no the ashes you know what Eugene you know it you know it you know that's the mocking people's pain That's the that's the problem with the lowest form of humor Eugene I'm not allowed to dig in and get into the facts and get the merits of the story I am interested and I'm representing a huge demographic of brown people That one You've never said brown people in your life You heard him say brown people and now you're saying brown people like I'm not black Because there's never said brown you never said brown people in his entire life Sky's out here. I didn't hear the devil. This guy's out here. Guess lighting But why are you like this every time we speak about soccer? I want to understand. No. He wants he wants food pro You know what's funny is soccer came from football. Yeah, but the word soccer didn't come from America though We didn't do association football. Yes But soccer didn't come it's like it's funny how we like punish Americans for saying soccer But they didn't say soccer they were taught the word soccer by Europeans true And then Europeans flipped it and we're like no football you dicks stop saying football. It's soccer. It's it's it's yeah It's soccer. It's football then Americans don't come down equals a football So I respect him even more than I already respected him He calls it football. He calls it soccer. What do you think of Zoran? I'm a fan. I'm an admirer What are you a fan of? I'm a fan of the fact that he won an election the people thought he couldn't win Yeah, he won it by sticking to his guns. He didn't roll over He was a politician who basically ran from the left But didn't run from the right and I think we live in an age where Democrats anytime they get attacked They did a crap defensive crouch defensive posture Try and meet you in the middle try and compromise. He didn't do it. He said these are my policies This is what I'm running on I interviewed him in December 2024 Right at Zateo he was a less than 1% in the polls. I told him this later. It was a pity interview There was a Muslim guy running from Queens. He's a socialist. I was like, let's get him on. Let's give him a platform That day I was interviewing Hassan Minaj and I remember being like Hassan Minaj is just coming into the studio. I was like, we got to get this other guy out quickly I remember I vividly like Zoran Minaj said yeah, we'll do that first And then Hassan's coming. Hassan's coming and I remember you know, I had no idea at the time And I told him this later bluntly to his face. I've said this to him like I thought I was doing your favor Who knew? This guy would be a global sensation And I kind of in that first interview is when he said if Benjamin Netanyahu comes to New York, I'll have him arrested I remember that People were nuts at the time. Well, he didn't go nuts at time because there was nobody. Yeah, but when he became big that quote came back It came back to the point where in the White House Netanyahu is meeting Trump and a reporter says Zoran Mamdaddy says he'll arrest you and Netanyahu is like well Trump will come with me to protect me in New York And I was like wow and he kept getting asked about it and he didn't back down for it I mean he pointed out that legally he can't do it. Yeah, but the aspiration he never backed away from that It's not just Israel multiple issues. You know, he ran on like free buses child care. He had a bunch of very clear policies Waiting for a Democrat who could speak like a human Energize people young people. It's not hard. I always make the example of Donald Trump versus Hillary Clinton What was Donald Trump's flagship slogan in 2016? Build a wall. Yeah, what I thought almost yes. You remember right? It was 11 years ago. You remember it like it was yesterday What was Hillary Clinton's top blood slogans? I'm gonna break the glass ceiling I mean look nobody remembers what I mean, I'm sure she had an amazing 77 page child care policy But that's just how Democrats run with like we'll give you lots of stats and lots of proposals And lots of technocratic one kiss. Yeah, but Obama was yes, we can yes, which was inspirational Which was good any ran as a populist people forget you ran anti-war yeah people forget you ran against the right war and Hillary Clinton's record I don't think you can be anti-war when you get in I think there's something that happens to American presidents. Yeah, like I think you can be anti-war when you're coming in And then I think when you get inside the someone says something to you or something happens and then like Abra you got to do this thing man Donald Trump the great your man Donald Trump was fully anti-war. Well, he pretended to be yes I don't even know if he pretended 100 percent pretend you think he pretended No, man. I think he wasn't I think he was anti-war. No, I think he was they still more Just because of everything he said he was fully anti-war. There was no there was no point where he was like I'm for this thing Who cares? It's fucking Donald Trump. I can't believe your evidence. No, no, no, no, no, no, he said so maybe listen listen You see here's where we're gonna have a disagreement please you're making it seem like the man does not exist anywhere doing anything And has no opinion about anything. I'm saying There's some things I believe that he believed And I see not going to work. I genuinely think that man even though in his first term. He did lots of what he did not that man Yeah, do you remember when he launched like one missile? This is crazy where he launched like I think it was like one missile Towards cereal and that was eating chocolate cake and it was great you That's what he said at the time and then you were eating chocolate. I was like damn you know where you was I know chocolate cake So a good bet that night. I was eating chocolate And then he found out and then he found out how much each missile cost and then he was like I'm not doing that again. All right, so Donald Trump in his first term Expanded every war you inherited from here. Yes, you're not listening to what I'm saying I'm not saying that he did what he did. I'm saying I think there is something that happens to you when you get into the White House That eclipses your views on wars what I'm saying because to your point there is no There is no American president. Yes, who has come in and not done war so what I'm saying So I would give you that many of them come in and said I'm not doing war I know but the Donald Trump's different to any other president because he's done these two terms or the gap Did you did his hands by I do the hands the hands as soon as you said it the hands god I'm turning into Trump now 3 2016 you could have got away with Donald Trump. Yeah, you know, he's outside or whatever But we had first term Trump people just basically didn't want to pay attention People kept saying well, he never started a new war But every war he inherited he expanded in Syria in Iraq in Afghanistan He dropped the Moab the mother of all bombs on Afghanistan He did more drone strikes in his first two years and Obama did in eight years people don't know this is Obama the drone president He killed Hossam Soleimani the Iranian general in his final year in office Which could have sparked World War 3 so he did all this shit He's pardoned war criminals And then he goes into opposition He does his little retreat at Mar-a-Lago makes his comeback beats Ron the Sanders and he goes to Michigan He goes to Dearborn. He tells all these Arab Americans. I'm going to be anti-war Kamala's with Liz Cheney. She's going to send your people to die in the Middle East And that people believed and that was bullshit is what I'm saying That that period where he pretended to be pre-war then he comes in The seven bomb he bombed seven countries in 2024 right. He started 2025 But going off to Venezuela and I'm still saying and he did Iran on Christmas day didn't I Joe we didn't pay attention I'm still say in fact that just proves my point good when you're outside the White House You're like wars not good when you go inside there Maybe it's like as best or something in the war There could be something I'm just saying Where else have you seen the military industrial complex obviously that's what I mean That's what I mean. I think there is something if AOC ran for president won the presidency Do you think she'd be a war monger too? I don't know and I'd love to see maybe maybe she wouldn't be I have a belief that women don't go to war as much as men I think that women don't think of it as a solution the same way that men do I mean Hillary Clinton had a very hawkish record As presidents. Okay. We want to talk about as presidents. Do you get what I'm saying? So I'm just saying I don't think so we haven't had a woman president. We can't test that. You see that's so that's why we need to have one We had we had we had female prime minister as I say when I'm ordering extra food from a restaurant must do it for science. Okay But just yeah you must see How can you know things without testing them out? That's a good point. Do you know what I mean? How can we have testing Donald Trump for another four fucking years? Do you feel like this is consumed your life as a person? Yeah, so I moved to the United States America in March of 2015 He came down that golden escalator in May of 2015 So my entire period in this country. Yeah has been dominated by this orange freak in my private life my public life my waking hours my sleeping hours I thought we've got rid of him in 2021 and then he comes back again I just can't get away from him but literally what I said is I'm a Muslim. I'm an immigrant I'm a journalist every aspect of my identity intertwined. Yeah, it's fully it's there's no there's no part of you that can escape No, I just switch off and have a holiday and I won't think about him Well hang out on my kids, but my kids are Muslim American kids who have to grow up in this country with Trump as president. What moved you to the US? A couple of things one is just journalism opportunities Greater here I thought and secondly is my wife is American and a happy wife is a happy life. Oh nice. Okay. So where did you guys meet? We met in California. Nice. Yeah. Were you just here on a vacation? Yeah, I was on a lot of vacation. I've a lot of friends and family in America She moved to the UK Right, so the first half of our marriage she lived in the UK and she was like When are we moving to the US? I was like, what am I gonna do in the US? I'm a brown left wing Muslim. Who's gonna hire me? Right, so when I ended up working at the half post, which was owned by Ariana Huffington at the time at AOL It was like an American company. So I said all right. Let's see if I can make a shift So I ended up here in 2015 thinking I'll be here for a couple of years. That was the agreement. I'll come here for a couple of years I will cover the Hillary Clinton presidency Best laid plans now I I am not a fan of blaming people for things that Most would argue out of their control But just in the little time we've been speaking. I've noticed a pattern. Okay, I support it liveable Hassan started supporting Liverpool because Many Hassan started supporting Liverpool and then Liverpool went through its worst period ever. Yeah Many Hassan moved to America golden is great to have and the golden escalator happened and now the rest is history So I do next. I mean you tell me I'm gonna buy a plane ticket to Tel Aviv Can I ask you a question? I mean I mean just do you do you think no you're not you hear ever conversation? You have a conversation you feel that we've got with unbuttoned. There's no ties here. There's no corporate overlord - No, it's many, can't do it. We can all start freestyle rapping right now. - Can we? - I'm, you know what I'm saying? - I'm not very good enough. - Just talk about Liverpool. - Let's go. - Let's go. - I got it, it was all over. - Let's go. There is one tenet of this organization. Please, please Eugene. No, no, but like I, what I, I mean obviously that's a joke, I think more about like your life and as a person, like who, who has made it before? Like how did you get into this world? First of all, you seem, and not even seem. You are fully, like you fit fully into this position. I can't imagine you not doing what you do. - No, can I. - You're passionate, you're well informed, you are, you see when you tell me I don't take time off from this, I believe you. I don't go like, nah, this guy's just saying that. I'm like no, this guy, you sleep it, you drink it, you think it, you, you know what I mean? - Yeah. - It was a problem. - Was that always you? - No. - How did you become you? - It's a good question. I guess with the Trump phenomenon, Trump is a serious generous, like him taking on my life, I don't think any other politician can do that. - No, but I mean, I don't think there was a single, I covered UK politics for a living when I did it. - Okay, but let's go back. How did you get into that? What were you doing before that? Like why journalists? - I've been a political journalist on my life. - Yeah, but why, where did the start? Like we, as a little kid, where you're on the playground like, oh, I'm gonna cover the politics of the Labour Party and what happened with the Tories? - I'm not a little kid, but maybe 15, 16. Yeah, I get very political at that age. What were you saying? - That's a good question. I mean, it wasn't a very interesting period. It was in the mid '90s. Politics was very quiet in those days. I remember it was Clinton, Blair, End of History, all of that bullshit. I don't know why I got so play. It was very boring time. I don't know why I got into politics at the most boring time. My dad was very political in what way? - I loved politics. Old Indian men love politics in general, right? They just want to talk about politics at any event, weddings, funerals. They want to talk about what's happening in India, Pakistan, DC, London. That's just a fact. I don't ask anyone. And often the conversation comes back to the role of the CIA, right? So that's what most sounds like your kind of guy as you've seen. - Let's go. We need to hang out with Indian men circa 50 to 75. But so my dad was very political all his life. He moved to the UK in 1966 and was obsessed with British politics. He was obsessed with British Prime Ministers, the Labour Party. He's obviously obsessed with Indian politics. So I grew up around him talking about politics, hearing about politics, watching the news. The news was on 24/7 in our house. - Okay. So when I ended up being on the news as a host, like for my dad, it was like, amazing. Most Indian parents were kind of disowning any child who became a journalist and a doctor. - Yeah, Dr. Lawyer, engineer. - You can't be a journalist. And my sister and I both end up as journalists. And my mother as well. - Your sister as well. - Yeah, my mother is not happy about this. My mother is a doctor, my father is an engineer, like a classic Indian couple. And my mother to this day is like, stop talking about Trump. Why don't you go be a lawyer or do something different? Why don't you make something of yourself? Why don't you be a lawyer? If you want to argue, be a lawyer. That's what she's saying to me. When I say, you say to me like, yesterday morning. So, she hasn't given up. But my father was very proud of the fact that I was a journalist doing journalism politics. He loved it. He even passed away last year. But even so, thank you. Even to his last days, anytime we spoke, he'd be like, are they really gonna run Joe Biden again? - Really? - So you basically found yourself in his like, this was like his league, you know, it's like, it's the premier league or the NFL or the NBA of his, but it correct me if I'm wrong. It seems then that the two of you, it probably brings back good memories for you then. Because most people would have gone away from politics if it didn't bring back good memories. Does that make sense? - Yeah, no, but it was a great bonding moment. - But that's what I'm talking about. - I wouldn't talk about Liverpool. My dad was on football fan. - That's what I'm saying. - But anytime you call me, he'd be like, oh, I watched this video you did. I'm not sure I agree with what you said there about Trump or whatever it is. So that was always an interest, even till the very end. That was what he wanted to talk about. He was very upset. Any time I'd visited him, he always had the news on 24/7. He'd be like, oh, you know, this happened, this happened. Do you know what's happening? He was super informed because he just read the Guardian or watch Channel 4 News in the UK and CNN or whatever it is, Indian news. So that's in the household. That's stare around me. And then generally I wrote about this in a book. I wrote about debating, which is, I grew up in a house where we were encouraged to debate and argue and question and dispute. Like my dad and I talk about this in the book. In the late 1980s, Salman Rojdi publishes the Satanic verses. Muslims go crazy. It's a blasphemous book. It's insulting the prophet, which it did. I had to look for him. That was the one. That's where the comedy-- The fatwa. The fatwa. He should be executed for me. And at the time, people in the-- Do you know the story, Jean? Oh, yeah. Please tell the story because a lot of people, I don't think, just know it. Salman Rojdi, very famous Indian, British novelist, award-winning novelist, writes a novel, which is kind of fictionalized version of some Islamic history as he understood it, in which the prophet is portrayed in horrific ways as a baddie. And Muslims being very sensitive, got very, very upset to the point where, at the time, the Ayatollah in Iran, the Supreme Leader of Iran, then, Ayatollah Khomeini put out a very famous fatwa saying the punishment is death for this kind of writing. Rojdi had to go into hiding. He's still today. He got attacked a few years ago. Yeah, he got scared. So it's never gone away even after the death of Khomeini. And a lot of Muslims burn the book, even in UK town, not just in the Middle East. In protest. So it was a huge controversy. And Muslims then got attacked, of course, by Western monsters and you people are so backward and barbaric. And look at you. You don't believe in free speech. And my dad, in the midst of all this late 80s, I'm like 10 years old, my dad buys the Satanic verses, reads it, and then puts it on the bookshelf right by the dining table. So every time we have people over, they're like, what is going on? They're furious. All my dad's friends are furious. Why have you got this book here? Why would you have it? And my dad would say, have you read it? And if you haven't read it, how can you be mad about it? And that mentality, which is very provocative and the most agreety, is something that I remember vividly. This idea that you shouldn't just blindly follow the crowd. You shouldn't just take what's given to you from on high. You've got to question everything no matter how sacred. Did you read the Satanic verses? No comment. (laughs) I did, I did. And it's awful, but at least you read it. I mean, I don't read it as a piece of literature. What do I know about literature? How marriage is an award-winning novelist? I'm not. That's not the point. The point was, was it historically accurate? Was it offensive? All of that stuff. But the point is, obviously, I don't support, obviously, killing people for their views, obviously. But I understood at the time, I understood why it becomes such a wedge issue. You wanted to talk about culture wars today. I mean, that was a culture war. Yeah, that was viral before viral. Exactly, yeah, pre-intidate, pre-days. And then it obviously gets rolled into everything else that then happens in the subsequent decades in the relation between Islam and the West. I love that you encouraged to argue and debate by your parents. I think, yeah, 'cause a lot of Indian parents are like, "Shall I know?" I mean, a lot of parents in general, especially, yeah. The best chapel? No, what is that? So in the podcast, anyone watching, he speaks sort of the means. Chappel means, I'm gonna get my sandal. Chappel is a sandal. Oh, it's done. That's just like Chappel. You're gonna get me. Actually, you've just taught me a new one now. Thank you so much. What's your, what's your, what's your, it's the chapel? Chappel, I mean, I'm got it for you, Gina Chappel. Every time you say something, Auntie Liverpool, chapel right now. I'm coming for you, bro. Double chapel. Could you, could you debate at home? (laughing) You want to say it, guys? I'd say chapel. Yeah, chapel. (laughing) No. I don't think there was time for, for debating. Just as you knew, what you were told was what was going to happen anyway. I think, if, but if you answered bad, did you get slapped? No, no, no, no, no. I think if you grew up with a single mom, there's no, there's no one to defer to. Okay. Oh, that's interesting. It, debate happens when there's someone to go, right? Right? Talk to your wife. Yeah, when there's an audience to debate for. Yeah, but now if someone goes, at six o'clock, we're doing this thing and you're like, "But at six, and then they leave the room." I'm scared, too. Yeah, no. It's the law. Yes, it's just the law. Yes, it is what, 'cause when we saw debating, is when we went to White Kids' houses. Yeah, that was. And we saw the back and forth. Yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo. What do I need to do that? They're like, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo. The day Andrew, my friend, told his dad, he said, "Come to dinner." And then he was like, "Oh, dad, we're still playing." And I remember my body, getting the dance. It comes in that? Yeah, because I was waiting for his dad. And Andrew, like, he fully turned back. So, his dad came to the door. And then he was like, "Boy, it's time for dinner." And then he was like, "Oh, dad, we're still playing." And he was like, "Really?" But he just said a thing that I would have never thought of. "Dad, we're still playing." Right, we're playing a command and conquer, right? And he was like, "Dad, we're still playing." And then his dad, like, walked off the whole period between us going to dinner and the dad come, I sat there, tense, waiting for the backlash. Yeah, I don't know, but I was like, he turned his back fully. I was like, "How is he so?" No, he was like, "Blake." And then he was like, "Back here." And then I was like, "This is the whole time now." Yeah, I was then back. 'Cause you're like, "You can't just, you can't head on a swivel." That to me was not a concept that ever existed. But I think probably in hindsight, it went too far with me. In a debating. 'Cause now I'm like, "Crazy." Now my wife, my kids, my friends, my family, my colleagues have to put up with me being perpetually argumentative. Like I can't help it. But you enjoy it. But you enjoy it. Yeah, but they don't. So. It doesn't matter whether I enjoy it. The people around me are like, "Stop the fuck up." So when you got older, your mom was like, "Yep, you can have him now." Yeah, 100%. 100%. Yeah, my show, my mother would say that to my wife. That's what, seven seats we went on as in India. On my first trip, actually. We had a restaurant in New Delhi. And it was like a crew of people that's, you know, friends are friends at a similar old man. And we, one of the guys, we got into a debate and I was having so much fun. And then one of the other people he worked with didn't know that I was having a good time. And then he came and like stopped and he's like, and he's like Trevor, he's like, "I have to apologize to you. "You have to know in India, we debate for fun Trevor. "Please don't be afraid." I was like, "Yo, my friend, I've found my people." That's all I, I was like, "I have found, This is the motion. fun I've ever had, because we also argue for fun in that way, but I guess depending on which college you go to. You wanted to tell us stories, you could do the accident again. No, my fair, I do accents for every college. I know, but I love you're in the next. Every single country. And by the way, I don't do, I don't do accents. I like it in an accent. I do the people. There's a common misconception people have about you. So you imitate the person that you've met before because I don't, I, I'm terrible at accents. Are you? I'm terrible at, I promise you, I'm terrible at accents. But I can remember how people speak. Yeah. So if you sit to me like, do an English accent, I'll be all over the place. Oh, what are you going to for? I don't even know who the famous English person you can. Well, I can do a certain person who's on television quite a lot. And that's like, no, you know who that is? And I'll leave it. No, no, it's not. It's not you. Okay, I'll do it. I'll do it. I'll do it. I'll do it. I'll do it. I'll do it properly. Hold on. Because I haven't, I've got to think of him doing it properly. Hold on. Give me a second. Give me a second. Give me a second. Give me a second. Hold on. Hold on. I don't, I haven't lived that for 10 years. I don't want to do it. Yeah, but don't be biased. You're going to think of yourself. Okay. Clear your thoughts. Yeah. Breathe. Okay. Chocolate. Let yourself go. You got it. Go on. Okay. Let me, let me also channel him. Let me, let me get him completely. Well, that's bullshit. Absolute bullshit. And now, Tom found next story. Jeremy Clarkson? Yeah, that's it veered into Jeremy. Yeah. Yeah. It wasn't supposed to. Because the bottom part was more Jeremy than him. Yeah. It was. Yeah. It was. It was. And that's why the good guy. He shot. Who is it? Yeah. That's, that's you right. I went into a bit of Jeremy. Yeah. Who did you begin with? It was supposed to be Oliver, John Oliver. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, no, no. Because I haven't, because you're throwing me off right now. By the end of the summer, I'm going to do you. And then it's going to be over for you. All right. If you do me, let me do John Oliver, like any British person, like 60 million Brits. Trevor can't do any of them. Clarkson, Oliver, Hassan. And your defense of me. Well, I didn't know Mehdi was British. I thought he was just Mehdi. He is just Mehdi. Your accent has probably changed a lot. It has. Yeah. Well, I'm a bit of a sponge. So I pick up stuff wherever I go. So people make my, my British friends when I go back, make fun of me. But when I go back, I speak British. But when I win American, I code switch a bit. And then British people who are in my presence will say, that's weird. You don't talk like that when you talk to us. Do they say you sound American? When my wife moved to the UK, she had known me for like two, got a couple of years before we got married, but she moved to the UK and for me in my habitat, natural habitat, David Attenborough, talking to British. She's like, who the hell are you? So you don't talk to me like that. That's because you're Texan. So when I go to India, I become a bit more Indian. I speak a little bit with a touch when I speak to elders in my community. I mean, I just am a bit spongy. No, but you can't not be with my grandmother. Think about it. You as Eugene, the way you speak to us here. Yeah. No, you, this is what people don't understand. People like to think of it as switching. I think this is an academic use of a, you know, an academic understanding. Oh, your code switching. No. If you have ever lived in multi-lingual cultures, you have to learn how to speak different languages to different people, even in the same language. So if you think about it, the Zulu that you would speak with your friends is not the Zulu you would speak to your grandmother, even though it's still Zulu, the way you would say the words, the way you would, your sentences, your accent, even your tone has to change completely. So what I'm saying is sometimes people take for granted that anyone who's grown up in a world with their multiple languages learns how to speak the language of the people they're speaking to. It's not just like being, that's why I say like when people say like, oh, you're code switching. It's like, yeah, on an academic level, I understand that, but it's, it's not, but I couldn't talk to my grandmother with this accent. My grandmother's not conscious. That's the key point. I'm not doing it consciously. I don't know. I'm doing it to people pointed out to me. Yeah. No, no, you don't. And also here's the other interesting thing. For me, it's a double whammy because not only is it, okay, I'm living in America and I family, a British American. I've kids, one of whom, you know, grew up in the UK, one mostly grew up in the US. So the accents are different. My older daughter still has her, not solid. I say 60% British 55, 60. She kept on to it in the last 10 years, but my younger one came very young. So what I would say here is I'm also on TV. I also did three years of prime to American television. So just, I had to switch. So I would have people, producers would say, if you use that phrase, no, no, what are you saying? So I also had to therefore consciously switch times. I would want to use a British euphemism or phrase. And my team would look at me blankly, say no one knows what that means. I thought, really, we've never heard of that phrase. Never heard of that phrase. You never heard of that phrase. And then I, and then I would start doing things like, I'd be on TV talking about I know the war in Ukraine. I remember MSNBC and I'd say they fired missiles. And then people say, and then friends of mine would say, you say missiles now. You don't say missiles. And they'd be like, I don't know. I don't know. In fact, telling you the story right now, I'm not sure, as I'm talking to you, I'm not sure which one is British, which one's American. Mine was controversy and controversy. So I slowly took me four years. MSNBC two and a half years and last year I switched to controversy. Yeah. I said, controversy. Controversy for years. And then I switched to controversy. Yeah. So it goes, yeah, it goes back and forth. It's just one of those things that happens. It's life. But I still say tomato. You can't change that one. Tomato is a weird one. Eugene says water. But I say water a little bit. He says water, even in South Africa now. Can I get some water? Can I have some water? Can I have a water? That's exactly how you say it. You see a water? Are you getting nothing? Can I get now? Eugene is slowly transforming into a white American woman. How long have you lived in the US? You have not two days. You have not. I came here on Wednesday and I got a water on Thursday. Don't go anywhere because we got more what now after this. So let me ask you a question. Is there is there ever a part of you that worries about being left and like having an opinion and then also saying that you're in the news? What do you mean? So for a long time people said, if you're a journalist, you can't like have an outside. Just like the Supreme Court. You're supposed to be, you know, the Supreme Court was always bullshit. No, we know it's bullshit. I think the media, I mean, the media doesn't exist like that anymore. We're sitting in independent spaces. We're doing our thing. We're not bound by these old conventions. And the old conventions shouldn't even bind the people still in mainstream media. I would argue. It's killing our mainstream media right now because people are fed up with being patronised by people who pretend that they're neutral in partial and we can clearly see they're not. I would rather have, you know, there was a moment recently where Brendan Carr, who runs Donald Trump's FCC, he's like a censorship czar. Yeah. He was at a media conference. I think it was a semaphore conference in DC. Somebody started sending me a clip saying, Brendan Carr is talking about you. I was like, you don't want to be talked about by Trump's censorship. You're all beyond that radar. Right. And I tune in and somebody sends me the clip and I watch it. And he's basically complaining that lots of liberal, lots of mainstream journalists have left the media. And then now they're all like anti-Trump. And he's like, CC, we told you the media was biased against Trump. And then he goes, at least would marry the hustle. He hates Trump, but I like him because I know where I stand with him. He's very open about his biases and then you can just read or watch whatever he does. And I was like, hey, that's a good point. I got to take a shower now. See, I don't really want to be on Brendan Carr's radar because I'm very happy with my life here. And I don't want to be deported. So that, so you know, there's that thing where there is this sense of now people in independent spaces, we're seeing their real colors, whatever. But my position has always been I would rather people put their biases on the table. Yeah. And then just be fair. Right. So when I do an interview, I have a Trump person on where I have a Israeli person, where I have someone who I disagree with from whatever government in the world, someone from the Saudi, someone, whatever it is that everyone knows I'm critical of them. Right. Right. But I still try and be fair. I try and I don't try and edit them in a bad way. I make sure they get enough time to speak and answer. I don't try and lie about, you know, in the quest, that for me is more important. That for me is fairness, not this fake left, right pick a point in the middle and say, I'm impartial. That bullshit's got to go. No one accepts that anymore. It was never real to begin with. It's now become very apparent that there is no kind of fake impact. The view from nowhere, they teach you at German Journal of Schools. You're outside the UK. That's like, that was like a big one. I think it's even bigger in the US, to be honest. No one knows where he is. No way is made in no way. Yes. Maybe the BBC. Yes. Okay. That's what I mean. Okay. The BBC. But the US Journalism Schools just churn out people saying stuff like this. I think it's got to end now. Okay. Got it. And, you know, well, the BBC, American Britain have this role reverse, right? So in the UK, we have very, very impartial media, very, very heavily ready. We don't take a position. We're not tabloid. We're not sensationalists. And then you have all these really tabloid newspapers, really, really outspoken provocative, the sun and the mail and all of that stuff. Yeah. And in the US, it's the reverse. You have all these crazy cable channels, opinionated fire, you know, outspoken fire brands on cable and on TV. And then you have like, really, really state new times, the Washington Post, very boring headlines. We must keep impartiality. So it's a weird reversal. But I feel like this world is more, it's, I couldn't be wrong, but I feel like it suits you more. Like you, you strike me as like a wild west kind of guy. Yeah. It was weird that I ended up at MSNBC, to be honest. Well, I was at Al Jazeera where I was before. And I also wrote for the intercept. People would say to me, because I'd lived in the US for a few years. I'd gone viral a lot. I turned up on the daily show with your good self. I remember. And people were saying to me at the time, oh, it's only a matter of time till CNN or MSNBC, hi, you're not like, don't be silly. Why would they hire me? Yeah. I don't fit that persona. I don't do what the other hosts do. They're never going to hire someone like me. And then I was wrong to be fair. MSNBC, Phil Griffin who was present at the time, did come off for me a job. And I had three and a half very successful fun years there running my mouth. So in that sense, running my mouth, running is that a Britishism? No, no, no, I just liked it. It's just like that you said that running my That's what I do. I run my mouth. That's all I do in life. No other skills in life. That's not true man. That's not true. You're you're you're an informer for the police Hey, I knew there was something Sorry, weird. You know this guy. Yeah, we're not You just want to think I can love you never does this one. I couldn't love you. Never reveal this Yeah, you can't run your mouth I mean, I think I think you are Like many British people you will you will um You'll try and Dampen your your achievements or what you do like British people are very quick to be like I do I do Then you're like, but you're the king of England. No, please. I just wear a wear a crown. Sometimes You know what I mean? That's Americans are much more. Yeah, no you you do like you do a shit ton of research I don't think I know many more people who just know Stats off the top of their head the way you do Like you do you did you study like this did you know? I mean when you say study like this. No, I mean This when you were a kid when you were a kid. Did you did you remember everything in school? Yes, I had a very good memory. Yeah, you can recall Not old and gray, but like my daughter has a very good memory is inherited. Yeah, when I was young Yes, I had a very good memory. I couldn't remember you know put things on a table I can remember it names places. Yeah, even today. I still remember obscure like my wife will make fun of me that I will forget Kids birthdays, but I'll remember when the six day war was in 1967 So that kind of random stuff is still in here. I have too much shit in here You know Sherlock Holmes like the mind palace you must clear things out like I don't clear shit out So that's why I'm now in a situation where I can't remember like friends names and stuff But I can tell you you know, which you should name your friends. Yeah, you should then name your friends after like major Tragedies. Yeah, name your friends off the tragedies in history and then you'll never forget them And then just tell them it's like your nickname. No, but look I also now do have to do a lot of prep So I told you I mentioned I wrote this book and there's a chapter in the book on preparation. I do try and make it clear Especially to young people because they ask me this question especially budding journalist like how do you do what you do like I don't Wing it people think you wing things. I don't think you know anything This one I'm winging because I walked into this conversation. No prep. No, that's the way that's the way I'm gonna ask me That's the ready and I'll have I was ready. There's no ready. There's no ready. I know you're gonna be here That's how we surprise yeah, yeah, I don't even know what we started So normally I put you a many Hassan ambush and we're gonna play that clip first. I didn't even know what you guys are gonna I can't believe you guys said the shit about who are you? Yeah, they're different from when we're on the daily show. Where did the hair come from? You had a suit What are you there? There was a very different conversation. We talked about Pete Buttigieg I remember that we had a conversation as a presidential debate live debate damn you really have an insane memory I mean, I was the guess. Why would you ever be like? No, but that's not the point you you had I do remember what we talked about This this but that's my point you have an insane. Do you remember politics for some reason? Do you have a tough time forgiving people in life? Yes Well, I forgive but I don't forget. Yeah, but that's part of forgiving. I think no I can't get it. Yeah, I can't wait No, no, no, I'll tell you why okay. You tell me why you don't think so look if I forgive you I don't have to forget what you do. Nothing have to yeah, but I'm saying you said it's part of it. I argue My my belief is When you forgive somebody what you did when you I'm saying when you forgive somebody is in my opinion To your point the part of your brain that is holding on to the memory. Yeah, let's go in my opinion This is only my opinion. I'm not a neuroscientist. This is not medical if I this is not anything I did I'm winging this for the record. This is my opinion 100% I believe when you forgive Your brain or something happens in your mind and you're more likely to forget is I think that's a good point. I think that's a good point. I find I find people generally people who have amazing memories like this generally Struggled to forgive it is a problem that I do remember things that I should just let go that is a problem Just everything personal professional political. I mean actually helps me my journalism because the number one problem in this country is people have short Memories and that's why people in power get away with shit Donald Trump I gave you an example about the war thing. Oh, he's anti-war then I have to remind people okay Remember what happened between 2017 and 2021. No, because we all forgot it. I spent all of 2024 listening to Americans tell me Ah, you know what if don't Trump comes back. We survived him once we can survive him again No, we fucking didn't survive him half a million people died from COVID, but you've forgotten that right because Americans have the memories of goldfish Like eight seconds nine seconds done You know, I think we're actually have good memories. Do there's a myth is that a legend is a myth should affect We should check it out for a put it in the book or we should check it and put it in my books We should check it right now. I believe I remember reading this and maybe I read the wrong thing my fact check No, no, no, we should we should read it because I we should check it up now But I do believe that the goldfish thing is actually a myth If it is a myth then we should replace goldfish and we're just Americans should play the role of American No, no seriously Americans have no memory I'm taking my American hat off. No, that's I'm wearing my immigrant That's not true. It's not true. I don't think America. Do not remember. I don't have a love week. No, no That's why everyone gets to reinvent themselves So the so the fact is myths goldfish actually have memories that span months not seconds studies I've shown that they can be trained to respond to signals for food Mother remember feeding times and navigate mazes retaining that knowledge for at least several months However, I wish Americans had the memory of months. No, let me tell you something. Let me tell you something Yes, well, there's a gritty. Please. I think it is unfair to say Americans have bad Americans do not have bad memory anything I think any person who exists in an environment where they are constantly Water-borted with a media that is distracted They are the people so I'll give you an example in South Africa. You're saying they're being overloaded in South Africa We had a commission, right? That is it's still ongoing. Yeah. Right. They're the youth. Right. So we have a commission. That's on corruption If you talk to the average South African They are fully focused on this commission. Yeah, how many months has it been going for? Sure, it's been long now. It's been almost a year now almost a year There's no South African who's forgotten about it. Yeah, there's no South African who doesn't talk about it It is fully in the zeitgeist Yeah, but I argue because the South African media has given it's that it is on television every single day that they're on YouTube The clips go out on YouTube the clips go out on TikTok people are seeing it So all I'm saying is all I'm saying is I I'm not quick to say Americans have a bad memory I've watched the news in America. I've seen a story That is breaking on a Monday and by Wednesday they've moved on and I'm like how have you moved on? That's a that's a fair point about especially the Trump era where they where the the strategy is right What's the phrase to flood the zone with shit? Yes, exactly. That's the difference People Americans didn't forget about Bill Clinton when that happened the Monica Lewinsky, but the Americans didn't forget before Trump We forget many not many we did we did that's why that's why these people. That's why George look at George Bush's approval ratings They're really good right now, yeah George Bush's approval rate is a good right now. Yes But why he left office is the most unpopular president He should be sitting in the hake facing war crimes charges He was until Trump came along. He was the worst president of our lifetime But over time Americans for given forget they forget and then they forget like you want them to look at right now Where they're on why do they hate us? Why do they hate us because we remember shit? We don't remember we shot down their plane. We deposed their government. We supported Saddam Hussein didn't they we don't have any memories of anything We did we're bad at history. We're bad at remembering so I'm gonna respond to you, but then I also have a question for you So the first thing I will say is That again is not people forgetting in my opinion. I don't think anyone forgot what George Bush did I think because of recency bias and because of the way people perceive things that happen in time George Bush now for the average American seems like a much better option than what they're experiencing at this moment in time A because they're not experiencing it right now and B because George Bush I would argue was doing worse things to the world than he was doing to Americans So the average American for the most part was experiencing less less of Bush's badness than the world was right So that's what I think was happening the other question though that I have for you for this is When did you start saying we for for for what America was doing? It's a great question That's a really good question because I'm not just said we invaded them we bombed and I don't know the answer to that question Sometimes and you notice what I said before we I said Americans have bad memories and I immediately clocked myself and said Let me put my British hat on take my American Yeah, I'm multiple identities So when I talk about bad American memories, I'm talking as an immigrant outsider, right? But then sometimes I'm an American insider now that bothers Republicans, you know the new phrase du jour is deport and denaturalized. They said about the mayor of New York. They said about Ilhan Omar They said about me multiple Republican members of Congress for me to be deported. They say we're gonna send you back to the UK Which makes me laugh because growing up I was told to go back to India now. It's like I'm gonna send you back to the UK Ooh, that's a real scary and so you get sent me back to London are you? Oh, not to London I mean you got to get you got to hand it to the racist. They've gone up in the world But that is the crap I get now and because they don't accept me as a real American Naturalized Americans are not real Americans apparently unless you're Melania Trump So that is a good question. I don't know when I started saying we I wonder if my MSNBC team know because I became a citizen October 2020 a month before the 2020 election just in time to vote against Trump and I don't know It's a good question. I know I was very happy to be a citizen Because I want to have skin in the game. I don't want to be just an outsider just pundit running my mouth I appear as Morgan when he was here Obviously, I have shots American kids and I have dual national kids. I have an American wife I know I live here my future No, no, I'm not saying to you, but just the people who wonder like something. Why does he live if he doesn't like it? So I'm like no, I love it. I love it. I don't like American foreign policy. I don't like Donald Trump But I love the United States America. So they're clear that I spoke at a no king. I spoke at a no Kings rally Right two interesting things about that. I spoke at a no Kings protest Number one, I spoke behind Bulletproof Glass, first time in my life. That's the world we live in now after Charlie Cook. It's really strange, by the way. I love the organizers spend a lot of money on the Bulletproof Glass, but it was only at the front. There was nothing on the sides, which I felt was a little bit of an inadequacy when there were people all around the stage. Anyways, that was weird. Being behind Bulletproof Glass, for the first time I've spoken hundreds of speeches in my life. First time behind Bulletproof, did you make you give your speech differently? Like, did you move a little bit more? Do you wiggle? - Yeah, I didn't have the same rapport the audience felt distant. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Half the people on the sides who could choose any time. And then number two, my mother watched it, because it went viral and someone sent it to her. - From the side? - She watched it from England. - And she called me and she goes, "Okay, I noticed you said, "I love America, I want to save my country." She was, "When did you start talking like that?" Before you tried that. And I was like, "Ah, shit." 'Cause my mom's not a fan of the fact that I became an American. She wanted me to stay British. - Oh, she wanted you to stay British? - Yeah, yeah, she's. - But where was your mom born? - I'm a born in India. - What a beautiful irony. - Yeah. - Which is exactly the point I made to her. I said, "You became a number good, "move to another country, why can't I?" - Nah, I think she's just anti-American. - But what do you love so much about America though? - Many things? - Mm-hmm. - Tell me, I'm here for you. - All right, I love. - America. - Eugene loves America. So he's just asking for you to validate it. - You've only been here two days ago. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - It's two days of my life. - Yeah. - Yeah. - What do I love about America? - I love the, I love the sheer space. - Yeah. - I love the fact that it's a big country. I love that flying to California is like flying to London. I love that. I love that there's a country, continent. I love the fact that you go to different states. I travel a lot for work and every state you go to is like a little mini country with its own kind of people, problems, issues. I love that. I'm all about diversity. I'm sorry, sorry, right wingers. I love my diversity, my DEI. So I love the fact that people are different wherever you go in this country. That's a good thing, not a bad thing. I love the food. I'm a foodie. I love junk food. I love American junk food and fast food. I'm not a snop. I love the shit stuff. I was born for, I was a movie cinema last night and I ordered a milkshake. - What did you watch? - I watched Mandalorian and Grogooth. - Is it good? - Right. - Are you a Star Wars fan? - Yeah, I'm a fan. - Who is it? - Lots of people are on Star Wars fans. - No, okay, no, then I would be careful then. I would say that I. - If you're not a Star Wars fan, you probably won't love it. - No, no, no. This is why I'm careful. So sometimes when people say, are you a fan of something, they just mean do you like it? - In fact, in general, I mean do you think about it? - No, no, no. - On May 4th, do I say May 4th be with you? - Yes. - Yes, but not as like a, like I have to. I just like that people have said it. - No, no, no, no, no. - It's an answer question. I love the TV show. - Yes. - To convert TV shows into movies. - So it starts with the movie. - It's a movie. - Yeah, they made it a. - But it's doing the real world. - It's doing well at the box office. - It doesn't suck, it's good, but it's not great. And it could have been better. But I love the show and I love Pedro Pascal, so I went to watch it. But I ordered a milkshake. - Yeah. - I love a movie, it's a classic, I love it. I love it. I love it. I love it. I love it. I love it. - Did it come in the Grogoo Cup? - No, it didn't. - Oh. - But it came in a fucking huge cup. And I'm like, this is what I love. - First time I went back to England when I realized I'm an American. I went back to England. I was doing my show for Al Jazeera, went to a cafe across from the filming. I ordered a brownie. And this tiny little piece of shit came on the plate. And I was like, what is this? I was like, oh, I'm in England. (laughing) And that's what I was like. - I'm American. - What about the generally sunny disposition? - Do you find-- - No, that I don't like. You don't like that, I'm British. - You can head off, British head on. - Okay. - I don't want to talk to you unnecessarily. I want to keep my head down. I'm the guy on the tube in the UK. You mind your own business. You keep your head down. You don't engage. - I'm not giving you a little bit like that as well. - Not giving people directions. - No. - New Yorkers are unnecessarily chit-chat. Here's what we have a nice day. - Here's the thing people get wrong about New Yorkers though. New Yorkers mind their own business, right? And because it's a phosphate, people be like New Yorkers are not friendly. I don't agree with that. I just think New Yorkers understand that everyone just want to get somewhere and go somewhere. So you can't be just stopping everyone. Hey, how you doing? How's your life? You're interrupting people's lives. But if you want to see how good New Yorkers are, do something wrong. And they will very quickly correct you and help you. - No, say out loud. Ah, I'm going to the queens and I'm going to take whatever, the F-trainer. Someone will be like, no, no, hey, hey, hey, wrong, they're wrong. They'll be like, no, don't worry. - To go back to your point about sunny disposition. If you mean like kind of department store, have a nice day, that annoys me. - I love that. - But if you love it, okay, I'm not a fan. But if you mean kind of sunny disposition as in, what's my world, my world with politics. If you mean kind of Barack Obama, Zaran Mamdani, inspiring speech, tear jerking, I love that. - Okay, so you like that part? - Yeah, like I'm the guy who watched West Wing and I corny West Wing. Like people make fun of people like me. I love the West Wing. I'm that guy. I apologize. And I don't people hate that part. - No, what do you mean? You don't know somebody's West Wing, man. - Yeah, but I mean, we don't. - But I love that. - Why do we have to apologize for that? - The British political cynicism? - I prefer the American. - Okay, so you've taken. - So you've taken on the general optimism? - Yes. - That's the thing you love about America. - I'm a democratic optimism. - I'm with you. I'm with you, but then when it comes to the niceties. - Yeah, I'm still a Brit there. - I'm still a Brit there. It's like I can't be fake. - Do you have the fake apologetic thing that British people have? - I'm not sure. That's a good question. Do you have to ask someone else? - Do I apologize? - Yes, I do. I apologize all the time. - No, I'm asking. I'm asking if he has it still. That's all. - I'm not sure. I don't know the answer question. He left us people around me. - So you fully in then? This is like. - I'm fully in till I get devoted. I'm fully in. - Are you worried about being a portrait? - Yes. - Why are you genuinely? - Are you not? - No. - Then you're stupid. - Well. - We're gonna clip that. - We're gonna clip that for sure. - I mean, I don't know what to say. - Yo, if we don't clip this thing and put in just the back-and-forths here with. - No, back-and-forths. I'll make sure we're clipping all of these moments. Yes, you'll see, you'll see. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no No, no, no, no, no, no. You're wrong about your own. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I would have gone and become a lawyer like my mother asked me here, my mother says, stop talking about Trump, keep your head down, and I'm like, okay, and then I go do Jubilee, and then I'm like, oh, I didn't keep my head down. Yeah, I actually, I actually care, and I don't, I don't say this like just to say, I actually care more about the people who have to worry about it. That's what I care more about. So like, families being broken up, people who've built their lives here, you've got multi-generation, you can't represent. This is their only chance. That's more the thing that I go, ah, man, and, and maybe a not so popular opinion, I worry for the United States. I agree. Because I think, I think any, like, if you, you know, we've had this conversation, we talk about the repay, the replacement population or rate of replacement in China or in Germany or in Japan, places where they're seeing what happens when you're not having enough children being born or enough immigration. But it's just you, your country cannot replace the population at a high enough rate to sustain your economy's growth, and there's almost no country that has done that without immigration. It's very difficult to do that immigration because this is weird thing that happens. No, Elon Musk says you can do about having lots of kids, and he's trying to show us the way. By the way, what was it like talking to his, you actually, didn't you interview, actually, he's like, glad, baby mama, he's, he really don't have a boss anymore. I don't think I've ever heard a journalist say, baby mama in my life, right? She's with that accident. No, no, no, but the way he said it, baby mama, um, what did you make of that? As a Brit, I'll say, I apologize. She took any offense. No, no, no, she seems cool now. I mean, look, people asked me. Yeah, that's what I mean. That's what I mean. That's what I mean. You said, she, but I seem cool now, but I'm a cynic. Yes. I said this to Ashley when she was on the show. Yeah, I dealt with too many people who kind of, I've left Trump world and I've converted and then they haven't really converted or they're just out there for the grift or, you know, you look at Michael Cohen. A lot of people, people at MSMBC when I was there, loved Michael Cohen, he'd be on the show every day and suddenly he's back in the Trump folder, whatever. So I think a lot of these people are very skeptical of like who come very late to the party. Although to be fair, she said she had no regrets. I mean, I asked her straight up, you know, do you regret being fooled by normal. She goes, no, I got a kid out of it. She goes, I have my child, thankfully, so I would never do anything differently. But she, she talked about how he impressed her and I don't understand anyone. I find them to be one of the most repulsive loads, some charisma free, humor free people on the planet. I get it. He's a richest man in the world. So that has a certain appeal. But yeah, I, I confused when, when I, when I talked to her about why she ended up with him. Huh. What were you hoping to get out of that interview? I wanted to know how much they paid her. They offered to pay her. She talked about Ray off a date. She said on the show, she said they offered me the, uh, uh, an amount, the size of a GDP of a small country to not speak. And she didn't sign it to keep her freedom to speak out. And she's been speaking out a lot. She's been a lot of places she was on Jennifer, weren't she's podcast with Hassan Becca? She was on my show. Now this is, this is what's interesting to me. What does she say is the reason that she flipped her views on the world? I asked her that question. I think she said it was being exposed to people she'd not been exposed to being waking up to the grift on her side. She told some great stories about being in, like, WhatsApp and tech groups would, like, Trump kids and eight mega influencers were all just getting the marching orders. Some of them are just getting money for what they're doing. You can cameo these guys, like, the equivalent of a few hundred bucks, if you get a mega info, say whatever you want them to say. We live in a world where you click online, you do not know if the person posting on Twitter, Instagram, threads is posting because they believe that was someone's paid them. And that applies on both sizes of divide, by the way. You saw a recently Tom Steyer, the guy running for Governor of California, Billionaire, was paying liberal influencers to say nice things about him. I didn't see that, actually. So it's a world we live in, though. It's just me, you Trevor, who actually speak of a knife or an ostrich. Ah, me, my man. I get paid to hang out with this guy called Eugene. South Africa pays me. It's this weird deal that I have. They're like, you have to roll with one. You have to roll. And I'm like, okay, Eugene, let's roll. To keep the side up. Let's roll my friend. The payout is my friend. My friend. The small apartment club. We're going to continue this conversation right after this short break. (bright music) (funky music) - I worry because there's a gift and curse when it comes to everything, right? - I say that all the time, but I do believe it. One of the curses of having a media that is controlled by a few people is that it is controlled by a few people. And we don't realize that our news is being filtered through the lens of a few. - Yeah. - One of the gifts is that there's accountability 'cause you know where to find these people. So even Fox News could be sued by Dominion voting systems and they could lose and they could pay the money, even Fox News in that way. But now with the internet, the way it is. - A lot of Ms. Rando. - You can run an entire campaign that lies to people. And the thing that I don't mean is never find the source. - Yeah, I don't mean this like in a political way. Like, oh, it doesn't fit me. No, no, no, no. What I just mean is it can make human beings feel like their world is worse, more better or different than it actually is. And it can make them create or vote for a world that is worse for themselves without realizing it. That's like the most pernicious side of it is. - Do you remember the Johnny Depp Amber herd issue? - Yeah. - A lot of that was kind of online artificially boosted. - Yeah. - The recent, what am I figuring in the names? The recent big Hollywood row. I'm having a mind block. See I'm old. I can remember more. - The recent Hollywood row. Blake Lively. - Oh, damn, look at that. - Blake Lively and Justin Boldoni. A lot of that, there was a New York Times piece about what people were doing behind the scenes to gen up opposition to her. So you don't know what you can believe anyone. A lot of people out there just innocently living their lives, walking down the streets of Manhattan on their phones, not knowing that they're being manipulated and gaslit. - Yeah, they're seeing a lot of people saying something, but they don't know that those aren't a lot of people. Those are basically paid actors. You know how they put in the bottom of an ad even on TV? If you still watch TV, they'll say, not a real person paid actor. They even, even in that will they have to tell you. I know that I'm telling you to take this medication, Sky Rizzy, but I'm not a real person. I love, by the way, that, you ask me what I love about America. I love pharmacy ads, they're hilarious. - They're amazing. - Drug ads are amazing. - We don't have them in the UK. - They're phenomenal. - When they read out the side effects. - Yeah. - Because they're real. I don't remember lost in New York. - He's hearing you. - He's smiling on screen. - My favorite is the fact that they say, ask your doctor about it. I'm like, if my doctor cannot tell me about the medication, I don't trust them. It's just weird that you're gonna be like, ask your doctor about, now I'm just walking and be like, so doctor, tell me about, I don't know how many doctors hate that actually. - I know. - You're doing your job. - Okay. - No, that one doesn't get me. You know what, the worst one is for me. I understand that all medication can have a side effect and I understand that they have to list this. What gets me is when the side effect is the thing that you were being treated for in the first place. That's the one that gets me. That is not a side effect. - You understand what I'm saying? - So if they say, do you stuff it from constipation? Take this medication. It may cause drowsiness, it may cause suicidal thoughts, it may cause death, it may cause skin rashes, that's side effects, I understand this. I'm not even judging you. But when you go, side effects may include constipation. That's not a side effect. That's the thing not working. You must say sometimes it doesn't work. You can't say the side effect of the thing is the thing that I already have. That's not how it works, bro. That's when I have an issue with those ads. Otherwise, I think it's great. I think it's a fun time. I sit there and I enjoy it. What do you watch when you're watching stuff, by the way? - Oh, I've said this before because I don't really watch much other than action films. - Well, yeah, what do you go to Jason Stade? - I like that. - Because he's English? - No, no, I knew you were gonna say that. - No, I don't know. - No, I mean, I do love that. - I do love that. - I do love that he has the kind of, they have to always give him some random English backstory. 'Cause he can't do an American accent very well. So in the majority of movies-- - Like me, I guess. - In the majority of movies. You can't do an English accent so far. We've seen poor John Oliver. Because he can't do a very good American accent bat. - I take off, I'll get it. I'll get it. It comes back. If he comes back, I'll get it. - He comes back. - He's gonna rush Jeremy Clarkson yesterday. - Yeah. - This is what's work. - But that's not like Clarkson either. But 'cause he can't do an American accent. In most of the movies, they give him some random backs. He left the Royal Marines. And then moved to become a bat. - They always do this. - This guy was suddenly there. He left the special boat service and moved to this island. - And now he has a normal job. Now he's just a fucking, you know, even though on the other day, what was the one I watched the other day? - I can't remember the name. - The Beekeeper. - The Beekeeper was a great film. I love the Beekeeper, but there was a really bad one recently, where he was on an island. I didn't rate that one. - He was still a worker though. - He's always a worker. - He's always like a. - He's always like a foreman, a driver. My favorite one, of course, transport a movie. - I mean, but that's one of the greatest movies in all time. - He's transport a one, two, three. They get better. - One of them buy the car. - That's when you know how he's dope. - It was started with the BMW. - Yeah. - Then he switched to Audi. - He was like, "Ooh, I want Audi." You gotta buy this Audi. You know when they can make like a family saloon look like, "No, this is the car you need when we drive in a family." So it was like, "A, but I mean it's like a big gumbag gumbag gumbag gumbag gumbag gumbag." - I had an Audi for a while after that. Not an A. It was an A. It was an A-Gumbag gumbag gumbag gumbag gumbag gumbag. - So they'd go. - And I remember when I moved to the DC, I had one. And it's a real American experience. I was sitting at a parking lot at like a Walmart or somewhere. And my wife or kids or whatever was inside. And this guy just walks up to me. Big white guy walks up to the screen. Looks and he goes, "A Audi." I said, "Yes." He goes, "Hitly use that car with slave labor." Damn. And I was like, "I was this close to say." And the White House was built with slave labor down the street. But I just moved to like a month ends. I was like, "Let it go. Let it go." - Do you think beef just finds you? - It does. It does. - No, and I say this, I genuinely say. - So I was on the train today coming up. - Yeah. And he might watch this sweet kid. Was next to be on the train. Turned out to be a fan. But he said to me, and if you're watching, I'm saying this very respectfully. But beef, we're in the middle of a train journey. And he turned to me and he said, "Oh, I'm a big fan. I've seen your videos." I said, "I think probably." And then he goes, "But I don't agree with you on genocide." "Tell me why you think it's not a genocide." And I said, "I can't do this here." Or an abstract train. "I've got to do Trevor Noah. I can't agree with my emails." I said, "I've done many videos you can watch." But it's hilarious to me that even the person who regularly trained wants to have a debate about the Middle East, right then and there. I guess, yeah, you've got, maybe you have like debatable vibes. Debatable vibes. To be fair, I then go and look for debates, too, which is what. Friends of family tell me, it's my fault. Like, I went and did Jubilee, which was probably a dumb thing to do if you don't want to have a debate vibe. 'Cause now you must have been in heaven, though. People under the age of 25, they don't know my name. They've never seen Jateo. They've never seen Al Jazeera. They're like, "You're that dude from the circle debate." But you're that dude from Jubilee. Mady, let's be honest. You were in heaven. I was not in heaven. You were in heaven. It's been half hours of my life, I'll never get back. Mady Hassan, let me tell you something. Have you seen it? I was not. So, you know that series on YouTube where they'll put one person against a group of people in a circle. And they have to run to the middle and argue with you or something. I thought it would be heaven. It was not. It was hell. Really? I went thinking, this is going to be fun, right? From 21, I like those odds. Let's do it. Some will let me out like, "Yeah, let's do it." I go there and you asked early about memory and date, too. I fucking prepared for this. I spent days preparing. My argument, you have four claims. Yes, yes, I had my notes. I had memorized constitutional amendment. My first argument was Trump is anti-the constitution. Trump is pro-crime. Trump, I can't remember my claims. Trump is whatever it was, immigration. Immigration is good for America. I had all these provocative claims with this Magra. And I had data, statistics, official reports, quotes, all up here. I was ready. This is me. I went in. First guy sits down, I'm like, "Oh yeah, the constitution." And he's like, "I don't care about the constitution." I'm like, "Oh, what do I do now?" It's like, "That of my fags or figures are relevant here." 'Cause I'm surrounded by bunch of white supremacists, fascists, and crazies. And that was a very strange experience for me. Because I went in thinking stupidly, not good faith to make, but some kind of debate. And what's interesting is to be fair to Jubilee, and I've criticized Jubilee since doing it. To be fair to them in other shows, Glenn Greenmore just did one recently with 20 Magra people. I've watched other shows. Yeah. And I watched them and I go, "How come I didn't get those 20?" Like every other show has some semi-normal beat. For some reason, what do you say, beef finds me, beef finds me. I get the 20 craziest people in the history of Jubilee. Like, I thought they'd be like two or three crazies and like 16, 17 normal. But the whole squad was like 19 crazy and there was like one normal guy. I genuinely thought you were loving it. No, no, just because of like how you roll in the debate. So the basically, you run in, you would love it actually. No, we're going to be on the 20. No, I think you just love watching it. It's just two and a half hours in a warehouse in LA with a bunch of white supremacists. And look, I want to make a serious point here. I do love debating, but this is going to sound very strange and cliched. I'm also a human being. And you sit there for two and a half hours with person after person telling you, "You're not a real American, you're not a white person, get out of my country." I didn't see that coming. I'll be honest, maybe I was naive. Because I've watched other Jubilies and other guests have not got that. Maybe those were white guys on the left who went on. Maybe because I'm a brown Muslim, it was worse for them. But it was a very strange experience to be told by one person after another. "You're not a real American, you don't belong yet. Get out, you're going to be the first to go." Then discover after the show that some of these people are like linked to the proud boys and are not sees online. Oh, damn. I was sitting with somebody. and I took like one security guard with me after I was asked, maybe I should took like 20 because afterwards, you're feeling like that's a very strange situation to be in. That is not a debate and a lot of people attacked me. A lot of people on the left said, why did you do that? Because you gave the wrong message out. You're saying that people of color should have to sit there and listen to white supremacists say this shit today faces. And I understood that and I respect that. I got criticized from both sides. And to this day people say, well, would you do it again? You're doing, I don't know, I'm torn. That's why when you said I enjoyed it. Like I thought I would enjoy it, but I didn't. That makes a lot of sense. Did it, do you think it changed how seriously you took the situation in the country? No, I already took it situation. No, no, but I'm saying, do you think it changed that did it again? No, but I hope others took it seriously. That's the only redeeming feature. I hope the stupid people that we talked about earlier who think this is all just a bunch of old white men and Mississippi who are gonna die out or the Republican body, they saw 20 young people in LA saying crazy, anti-Semitic, Islamophobic, anti-Black, great replacement shit. And I think people don't realize, this is not just some generational thing. Well, the racist is just gonna die out knowing I have a liberal, multi-racial America. No, no, no, no, this is a serious problem. There's a huge movement on the right that is young and vicious, the Nick Fuentes, the groupers. Some of these guys were linked to Nick Fuentes, I discovered later. And I think that is what was scary. And I think that was one of the redeeming features. When I look back and say, would I do it again? Do I regret doing it? I certainly don't regret exposing. I hope I exposed it to whatever the 15 million people, whatever it is who watched on YouTube to say, these people live amongst us, they are your neighbors. One of the guys Connor claims to have been fired after the show from his employer. I remember being on their thinking as he said to me, yeah, I'm a fascist, as he played down the Holocaust. I'm like, you're saying this? I'm not naive enough to think that these views don't exist in American society. But the fact that you now live in a country where you think you're on YouTube proudly and say it to cameras are filming you, your colleagues, your coworkers are gonna see this and it doesn't bother you? That for me was very stark. And actually for the vast majority of them, there was no consequences for airing those views on YouTube to millions. That should tell us something about where we are as a country and what's acceptable now in discourse. How afraid are you on a day-to-day basis? Like just when you're rolling in the streets living your life? I'm okay, yeah. I get a lot of love. Okay. The haters stay away. Or they're digital. Or they're digital or they watch from afar. I got one guy recently shout at me an airport saying you should be deployed and get out of my country. Like, scream at you or just say it. You sit under his breath. And I say-- That's even scarier in a weird way. But his breath, he said, he was like a middle-aged, middle-class guy, didn't look like a normal guy. Yeah. So what passed me under his breath saying, get out of my way, come what we said, get something about getting out of the country. Yeah. And I said, what do you say? Say it to my face. Maybe he worked for the airport and he put you at the gates. Or maybe he was just telling you-- So I did? No, you know, 'cause sometimes in life, you know they say like your perspective can shape how you see an experience. So you don't know. Maybe this person is like a grita or somebody who works at an airport. And then maybe they were singing in a good way. They were like, oh my god, there's Mary Hassan. I love him. And they were worried for you. And they walked past and they're like, you should get out of the country, man. No, you don't know. Unfortunately, I do know. Because when I said say it to my face, he said, you hate this country or threat to a country, you should get the fuck out. Fuck you. I like that you've verified it. I'm very-- OK, this is good. I expect you. No, because people don't do this sometimes in life, you know? You have a nail experience. No, I was surprised because I got a lot of hate online and in the mail, but not to my face. Actually, touch wood, I probably jinxed it now. But obviously now, events, especially post-Charlie Kirk, I have to have a lot of security. It looks really bad. I don't like feeling actually diva. But you do, unfortunately, given the level of hate and the number of guns in this country. But no, on a day-to-day basis, I live my life. I watch my Jason State, the movies I drink, my milkshakes. I don't worry about freaks. Here's something I've always wondered, because we live in a society where people are constantly being fed one idea of other people, politics, et cetera, et cetera. I often wonder if there's something you would say to people who have a singular idea of you that might surprise them. What would you say to people? Because I don't think there's any world where it's just a plurality, right? There's no world where it's just like them and us. Everyone has a shade of something. It's this gradient that goes from one color to another, et cetera, et cetera. There's somebody out there who is only being fed clips of yours that pissed them off. Yes, I don't know. They know nothing about you. They're just being like bullshit lies. Yeah, but I'm saying that there might even be stuff that you've said that people have clipped. Yes. You know what I experienced this for the first time, like in the starkest manner was when I did the White House correspondents dinner. I did the White House correspondents dinner is Joe Biden. At like any White House correspondents dinner, I roasted Joe Biden. I roasted Democrats. I roasted the little media, I roasted conservative media. I was like, this is what the event is about, right? What shocked me was the next day the clips where I spoke about anyone on the right went to the left and the clips where I spoke about anyone on the left went to the right. And I was shocked to see how even when we try and create a reality that is gray, the algorithm splits the black and white and goes, we'll send this to you. But I'm saying, what would you, it's like if you met somebody, let's say somebody walked up to you and they didn't say get out of my country. And they said, "Medi has done, I've seen some of the things you say about this country, and I just want you to know that I think you're really divisive and you're not, you're not part of making this country a better place, you know, I think you hate America. What would you say to them?" And if you saw, they were trying to be sincere. Yeah. I would say, there's many things I would say to them aside from saying, well, I love the country too. Look, I would say, and I say this because this is my politics, is that I'm the last person to be divisive. I think AOC has a very good line, which I will steal from out, which is, I want everyone to have healthcare. I want MAGA to have healthcare. I don't want to deprive my political opponents of everything. I'm a universalist, right? So I'm the last person you could actually call divisive because I want what I have for everyone else. I've been very blessed. I've been very privileged. I'm part of the 1% or whatever you want to call it. I want everyone to have access to healthcare. I want everyone to have a roof over their heads. I want everyone to have a job that pays well. You know, I started a business. I'm as American, you know, American dream immigrant came, I'm a fucking socialist running a business, right? I'm a entrepreneur now. I do stuff like, make sure you subscribe to the tear, I feel dirty after this, but you've got to do it. Full business. So like, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm a proud American, right? I'm a proud American dreamer. And my position, my politics are, in fact, the opposite of divisive. They are universalists. They are, I want a high minimum wage for everyone. I want healthcare for everyone. I want college to be accessible to everyone. I know it sounds cliché, but that's literally what, it's always makes me be fun when we go, oh, the far left and the far right are the two divisive forces. The far right and not sees you want to get rid of black people from America. The far left want universal healthcare. That is not the same thing, right? Bernie Sanders is not the same thing as Nick Fuentes. And if you think that, your brain is broken by the algorithm. Huh. I like that. I would also say I enjoy a good Jason Statham move in. I hope the mega voter does too. I feel that mega likes Jason. That actually is where you, let's do watch Beekeeper 2 together, you know, to be or not to be. Is that what he says? He says it. Ah, yeah. Of course he says it. You think he went through it because that is amazing or not to be. That is amazing to be and he kills the guy and then he kills the guy. You know how you're going to act like you don't love him. You know what? Beekeeper. Fire, my man. Never watch anything by Jason Statham. Why? Marathon, my brother, me and you. Why? I wasn't going to get into it. And then one day I saw what's expandable. You know, I saw a video of him that he was almost an Olympic diver. Yes. So one, you've never watched Jason but you know that better trivia, the only hardcore fans know. He was almost a British Olympic diver, yeah. Yeah. For me, people who pivot too much, people who over pivot, you know if he became a swimming instructor. Well, his next movie, he's on a boat. He's on his way to the trailer last night. If he became a swimming instructor, I would have been like, yeah, that's within the realms. He went from diving to becoming a Hollywood actor, but he doesn't claim to be an actor. Well, of course he does. He accepts his offer. Also, didn't claim to be a diver. Didn't Jean-Claude Van Damme also go from, wasn't he like a dancer? And then he went into, yeah, he worked at his dad's gym and then he went to, yeah, he worked at his dad's gym. Jean-Claude Van Damme. I mean, come on. He's not Jason Statham. Whoa. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He could have been. Yo. Jason Statham. Jason Statham. First of all. Statham would kick his arm. My friend. Okay. Let me start by saying this. You're stupid. Okay. Secondly. Secondly. Yeah. My friend. You. I grew up watching Jean-Claude Van Damme. You have the memory of a goldfish. No, I didn't. I could tell you I've ever thrown up. Bloodsport. My friend. I could watch Bloodsport in every day. There is no world. There is no world where you can make a statement as it would be a close fight. Yes. Would it be a tough fight? I'm cop. My friend. There is no world. I watch him now at the beach shit that goes straight to streaming where he's like an old assassin retired. What does that mean in what would in what would in what world are you going to be what what what was it. I don't know. He has a gun now because he can't do splits and kick any more because I said old because you said he's old and you did this. Yeah. Jason. Jason stay. Jason stay. What will. No. What will. You think you're serious. You think this Belgian dancer is going to take out. You think this is British. You think this British diver. You think this British diver is going to beat kickboxer with cheesy life life. Disguised bruh. Ah. Do you know Tom Poe? Ah. I mean, you're playing games you. Have you seen Universal Soldier? My man. I've watched all of these on the only movies we've had in South Africa. I think Dolph Lundgren would have kicked John Claude Van Derbs. Yeah, but that's a tough one. But that's a tough one. I'll give you Lundgren. Yeah, but I'm saying that I won't give you Van Derbs. My man. I'll just stay them. - So you see when you put your foot like this. - Yeah. - Over your head. - Yeah. - Relax. But he doesn't hit people with it. Stay them actually just break some bones. - This guy, you know what, Mehdi? - Overpivotus. - No, I think you're crazy. I hope you get deported. This guy just said the craziest thing of all time. - I'm just gonna say this, because one day I dreamed to meet Jason, stay them. You're gonna clip all the other clips, me, I'm clipping this, and I'm tagging Jason on Instagram. - This guy, I'm gonna say-- - I can defend him. - Yeah, sure. - The muscles from Brussels. - He's from Brussels for God's sake. - You're bringing in real things, which is not fair. - 'Cause I'm not bringing in a single real thing about Jason's statement. - I am. - I'm not a single person. - I'm not a camera. - I'm not bringing in a single. - Fine, uncharacter. - You're hitting below the belt. - No, no, I'm saying, let's take their characters. - Yes. - You're gonna take this like "wussy, time cop, "double impact, Hong Kong, do." And you're gonna put him up against X, S, A, S. Jason, stay them who doesn't take shit from anyone. - You're transporter too. - Blowing up things, shooting peep. I'm talking straight, hand to hand. - Hand to hand, I'm talking hand to hand to hand to hand. - Have you seen the beekeeper? - John Krut van Damme. - Oh, just by the J. B. - You'll be here. - No, you'll be here. - You'll be here. - John Krut van Damme, you'll be here. While you're here, you'll feel something here. - Do you think a stave doesn't kick? - You kick you like, you never see that. - So you lied. - Show me Jason's statement. - When you say them highest kick. - Show me Jason's statement, highest kick. And show me John Krut van Damme's highest kick. - John Krut van Damme, I'm short, so you don't need to do a high kick, he's a short guy. - I'm going to try and we're going to raise funds and make this movie. - Let's just clip this, tagstay them and see what he thinks. I want to see you both would stay them in the chair. - Why not stay them? - I didn't say you're the one who brought the stick up out of the yard. - You're the one who made it antagonistic. - I was happy with both of these heroes. I love the transport, and I said stay them would kick Jason's. - You see, you see. - You made it into, I'm just about me. I make everything for debate, or obviously. Even real fights, somebody has to win and lose in everything that I've heard. - What do you think you loved about action movies? What got you? Like why action movies is what I'm saying? - 'Cause you could have it some. - Yeah, but you could have loved romantic comedies. You could have loved romantic comedies too. I just don't watch them now. - Oh, okay, also you went through a period. - Yeah. - But action has stayed with you a whole life clearly. - Since I was a kid. - Who did you want to play with? - He man's a kid. - He man's a kid. - I grew up watching him. - He man, do you think it's going to be good or not? - No. - I'm worried about too many sequels. I think at some point-- - No, no, no. - No, but I-- - No, I mean, they killed it with Bobby from the body sense. - I grew up watching. - Yeah. - And I don't know why I like it so much. Maybe because I was the kid in the playground who got bullied and I'm not good at fighting. Maybe I saw that as a kind of a scape, and I saw myself in JCVD. Did you, when you were getting bullied, the JCVD wasn't my guy growing up. - Bruce Willis. - Bruce Willis was your guy. - Die hard. - Die hard, die hard. - That's an interesting one. For a kid, I don't know why I think that-- - How old was I, die hard? I was 12, 13, 12, was die hard. 89, 19, I want to say 88. - When we got them was different when they came out. - That's so true. That's so true. - Yeah. - I remember the first time I talked to an American about something that was current in my world in South Africa, and they were like, that was it from 10 years ago. And we were like, ah, that just came out for us. - That just came out for us. So I-- - No, but I love Arnie, obviously. I loved all those guys. They will turn out to be Republicans. Now I see everything politically. So much. - No, man, don't do that to yourself. - Slice alone Republican. - No, don't do that. Let me tell you something. - Arnie is a good Republican. - Let me tell you something. - Maddie, Maddie. If there's one thing I can hope to leave you with when you leave this podcast is. Do not do that to yourself, because here's the thing we take for granted. Because we live in a world where people have now been forced to live their politics first, and their humanity second. We have now created a world where we no longer see humans anymore. We see the politics. And then we forget that there's a human. But we don't understand that humanity is at the center of politics. If I cannot see as a human, we'll never get to a place where we agree because we've already started with not agreeing. - I agree with that. - So what I'm saying is, and I mean this, because I remind myself of this, is I go, I have to live in a world where I'm willing to accept certain people have done beautiful things for me in terms of their art, in terms of their music, in terms of their movies, whatever it might be. Then I find out that on a personal level, they have different political views to me. That will take nothing away from what you gave me for my whole life, my whole childhood, my whole everything. Because I'm like, "Yo, man, okay, fine. You have to do it." - I agree with that. You identified them on the screen. - Yeah, but I'm saying, don't rub yourself off. Don't rub yourself off. - I'm trying, I'm not trying. - No, I try not to find it. Especially now with the genocide. Right? For me, the biggest moral issue of our time is the genocide. - Yes. - I see celebrities act as through that prism, and that's a real problem for me. My mother is like a hard cause, but I love Helen Marin, and it's like, "Ah, it's pain for me. Does that mean I'm not going to watch the next season of Mobland?" Yes, I'm going to watch the next season of Mobland. - Okay, okay, okay. You're amazing. - Even though apparently Tom Hardy got kicked up. No, but they negotiated, and they say, I think they saw the backlash, and they've now said they're working on it. - I love Tom Hardy as well. But the. - So that, I agree with that. - Yeah. - But it's hard. I don't dispute that. - I don't dispute that. - And by the way, I would do the reverse, too. So someone like Key for Sutherland, who is a super lefty in real life, his grandfather was in a show 24, which I loved. Super Islamophobic show. - Yeah. - There's a debate about that. It was a super Islamophobic show. - That was peak, anti-Muslim propaganda. - Yeah, war on terror. - War on terror. - Every show was war on terror. - And seasons 2, 3, 4 became the old Muslim terrorists. Even Cal Pen turns out to be like a sleeper terrorist in that show. Loads of comedians in that show turned out to be. So many people I watch it now and I'm like, "Shit, Nick Hoffman is like a far right white supremacist." - Oh, I didn't know that. - In season 2. He's like, "Been he up in Arabic, I'm like, that's Nick Hoffman. Nick, you're in 24." - Yeah. - It's an early role. - Yeah, you're right. - Like there's so many mass jabrani, it's like a terrorist who doesn't go through. - I do know that. - Mass jabrani is like a terrorist who doesn't go through. I've really watched here recently with my daughter. So I was like, "Okay, Islamophobic." But like that show, I loved it, but I had to really torture it. Like a lot of Muslims like, "We should boycott this show." And I was like, "I want to, but I love it so much." But it goes against everything I believe in. And I met Keefer's other than once, and I got to ask him about it. And he kind of tried to put my mind to ease about like the on-screen Islamophobia. But that's the reverse. That's where on-screen, it's really bad, but you're still watching as like a guilty pleasure. Even though you know politically it goes against everything you stand for. - But going back to you as a kid, who do you think you were? Actually, because when I was getting bullied in school, my two defences were my speed. I could outrun most kids. And then was my humor. So I was like, "Okay, if the bullies do catch you, then I'm going humor. What was your. - Mine was similar. You got humor and more mockery, so as I was getting beaten up, I would make fun of them more in front of the people. - For real, for real? - Yeah, because my mouth never shuts. I run my mouth. So that was the main thing, right? They're going to try and beat me up. One thing they're not going to do is silence me, and that's how I've been all my life. So, you know, whether it's Republican members of Congress saying, "Deport May, he hasn't back to the UK." - Yeah. - Or the kid in school bullying me, calling me the P word. That was the same. That was the same. So it was always amounted. You're not going to shut my mouth. You can visit, you know, all the sticks and stones, you know, the crap. - Yeah. - The sticks and stones and your words are not fake. No, bullshit. I knew that from very old words will affect you. I've made words in my career, and that was the only defense I had. - That explains a lot, though. It's like, you kept that thing of, you're not going to shut me up. You might scare me. You might beat me up. You might threaten me. Whatever it is. But I'm still going to say, what do you think that gives you? And what I mean is like, what does it preserve of, you know? I mean, I would hope it preserves my integrity because ultimately, if you're in our business, at many points in your career, you're asked to sacrifice integrity. Your principal, you're asked to shut up about an issue. You're asked not to say, you know, as Noam Tromsky has often said, the worst kind of censorship is censorship by omission, right? It's what you don't say. Not what you do say is that's the worst kind of propaganda and brainwashing and gaslighting. And I think over the years, that's been the thing that I've tried to avoid in all my public life, my private life, as someone on the left, as someone who's a Muslim. Et cetera, et cetera, is just saying, you know what? I'm just going to say what I have to say. And obviously, to go back to your earlier question, this is why I love doing Zataya right now. As much as I loved MSNBC, I had a great time at MSNBC, I had a great time in all the other place I worked. All my experience had been great. I don't regret any of my journalistic career. But the moment I'm in now, that freedom, really, to be able to really just go for it without having to worry about any consequences, obviously some consequences. But in general, I think that is hugely liberating. And I say liberating in a very literal sense. Well, I'm glad that you get to be this person. Thanks for joining us, man. This was, thank you for having me. True joy. I'm glad we got to see, and good luck for the train ride back. If somebody approaches you, because you never know, this guy starts, he gets beef, he gets beef started. You never know. Oh, yeah. So on the way back, I find myself sitting next to Jean-Glau Vandab. Yeah. The muscle. The muscle. The muscles from. If you were from Brussels. Vandab, have you watched The Beekeeper? Let me tell you, you would kick your ass. Hopefully you bumped into Pedro Pascal. That would be good. Not wearing his mask. You didn't reply. I said this is the way. Yes. Is it? Of course it's the way. They didn't have enough of that in the way. No, they did, but not enough of it. I wanted more of it. Yeah, that is the best part of it. That is the best part of it. Well, matter is, from San Juan, the other side. Do you want me to make an appearance? No. Don't spoil anything. We're going to go watch it ourselves. That's what we're going to do. Made it, man, for real. This is great. Made it. What now with Trevenoa is produced by DayZero Productions in partnership with Sirius XM. The show is executive produced by Trevenoa Sanajaman and Jess Hackel. Rebecca Chain is our producer. Our development researcher is Marcia Robiu, music, mixing and mastering by Hannah Sprown, random other stuff by Ryan Paduth. Thank you so much for listening. Join me next week for another episode of What Now. (upbeat music)