It is actually possible to bullshit for 3 hours
and another podcast accepted truth that I refute
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Hellooo Sternal Journalists,
I’m in a bubble. You’re in a bubble. I know we’re all in bubbles. My bubble is manbun-core-tries-to-be-a-nice-guy-but-has-slight-dirtbag/fratty-tendencies-that-I’ve-mostly-tried-to-leave-in-the-past. The podcasts I gravitate towards are obvious (The Daily, This American Life, etc etc etc). I have a joke I open with when I do non-coastal elite-style places where I say, “I live in L.A. I look how I look. [dramatic pause] Whatever you assume about me is gonna be true.” It kills 90% of the time, but always bombs if I try it in L.A.
I’m also a neighborhood council. Most of you know this, but if you don’t, I’m on my neighborhood council in Los Angeles’ Mid City West neighborhood, and I’m nearing the end of my term in the next couple weeks. I was voted out, which is fine, but my time trying to make a difference has reminded me that, to get anything done, you should really try to understand and respect the people you disagree with. Strengthening that muscle has been an extremely rewarding, if at times frustrating experience, and I aim to keep it up for the rest of my life.
This is all a roundabout way for me to transition into saying that I make a bit of a habit of listening to podcasts that my archetype would not traditionally be into. And more often than not, I am reminded that basically everyone is acting from a place of fear. They just can’t agree what to be scared of. It’s probably a problem that will span the existence of humanity or at least civilization, but hopefully we’ll keep approaching a slightly better world.
BUT my listening diet had me thinking about a couple of quote-unquote truths I hear bandied about on these podcasts that I think it’s worth pointing out might actually not be true.
This all came about because I was listening to Andrew Schultz' podcast Flagrant. Schultz is a very successful comedian who is sometimes edgy and is one of the podcast hosts who was shamed for having Trump on as a guest in a lead-up to the 2024 election. Like the others who were finger-wagged at (Joe Rogan included), he makes very clear that he had reached out to Harris and Walz and wanted to talk to them. Also like (most of) the others, he states that he believes they ultimately decided not to because—and I’m paraphrasing, but I’ve heard him say some version of this multiple times—in his words, Harris was an unpopular candidate who stood for nothing and would not hold up in a long-form conversation.
Like Rogan, like Tim Dillon’s podcast, like Theo Von’s podcast, Schultz’ podcast is longform. It can for for hours. It is uncut. And, in Schultz’ words, you can’t bullshit for three hours.
This is a think I’ve heard Rogan say. This is a thing I’ve heard Schultz say. They believe that the people who do not come on their podcasts choose not to do so because they are going to be found out as inauthentic or frauds or whatever. I bet, in some cases, that is true.
But I would like to push back and toss out into the ether the idea that, actually, there are people who CAN bullshit for three hours. I don’t think every one of their guests are those people. I loved Schultz’ recent interviews with Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders, and didn’t think they were bullshitting. I am sure there are more conservative people they’ve had on who I would say I don’t think are bullshitting either.
But there’s a narrative that, with the three hour uncut sit-down, Joe Rogan and Lex Fridman and Andrew Huberman and the whole gang created some sort of bullshit-lie-detector medium in which people are forced to be their true selves.
I think that could be true for some people. In fact, I’m sure it’s true for some people. But I am also sure that there are lots of actors and politicians and lecturers and writers who, not only are able to bullshit for three hours, but that’s kind of how they got to where they are.
So that's podcast accepted truth #1 that I’m refuting. Again. I get the value of being able to have an ultra-longform conversation and there are some people whose defenses might wilt over the course of it. But not everyone. Plenty of people who are in the business of talking for a living can bullshit for days, if not weeks or months.
Because, and this brings me to podcast accepted truth #2, podcasters who are not journalists are not good at being journalists. They’re good at being curious.
I strongly believe that Joe Rogan is such an intoxicating interviewer because he is so curious. He wants to know a lot of stuff, and he is all ears when he gets you to sit in his studio. But the reason he’s not the best bullshit detector is because he let’s his guests convince him of whatever they believe. Sometimes, he might be able to push back if he’s heard otherwise, but he very often defers to his guest’s expertise.
They’re not bad at journalism because of some inherent flaw. They’re bad at journalism because they’re not trying to do journalism. They’re just trying to be curious. And curiosity is NOT the only thing. I believe that folks like Schultz and Rogan and whoever, when they aren’t in comedy mode (in which case being funny is the only thing—which I take no issue with), are often just in curiosity mode and not in fact mode.
Do they need to be? No, they aren’t journalists. They are podcasters, which is a new medium. But in a recent episode, Schultz decried a recent CNN interview with one of his colleagues (in that they are both comedy podcasters) Tim Dillon because he didn’t think the interviewer was curious.
I listened to Schultz’ review. I listened to the Dillon CNN interview. I listened to Dillon talk about the CNN interview on Rogan. And I genuinely think the reporter, Elle Reeve, was plenty curious. She did have specific ideas about conservatism in comedy which I actually think she was misguided on, but ultimately she had these ideas because she was a journalist who had done research and developed a theory that she was testing by talking to Dillon.
The conversation that occurred, in my opinion, was very illuminating because you got to see two people with two different perceptions of an issue reason through it together and, in doing so, create a sort of model for how and where we as a society disagree on a specific topic. To me, this is much more meaningful than if Reeve had simply asked Dillon a ton of curious questions about the comedy scene in Austin.
But it’s crazy that the headline Schultz chose for his podcast was “CNN Exposed by Tim Dillon” for a couple reasons. One, while I think Reeve was incorrect in some assumptions, she fully gave Dillon space to challenge and explain and disabuse her of those assumptions. Two, Schultz claims this one interview by a very specific alt-reporter who came from Vice shows that all of CNN was exposed in the same episode where he complains that the media narrative around the election was that “the podcast right” won the election for Trump. If you don’t want to be lumped in with all podcasters, don’t lump interviewer in with all of CNN and the mainstream media.
But anyway, this is all a super long way of saying that I have heard these two things—
You can’t bullshit for three hours on a podcast
Curiosity is the most important think for an interviewer (even if they are a reporter and need to present facts)
—stated as fact a bunch over my podcast listening the past couple weeks and I think we should maybe push back on them a tad. Wowza, what a rant. Anyway, here are some…
Recommendations!
Tim Dillon on CNN. Interview. Yeah, I think it’s worth watching! I feel like we need more interviews like this. Respectful disagreements and everything I said above yada yada.
The Phoenician Scheme. Film. Wes Anderson’s new movie starts pretty shockingly and is very funny. Plot felt light on first watch, and it’s one of his more cartoonish (without being literally one of his cartoons) movies, which I think most people like but I prefer the more grounded ones. BUT I also think I’m gonna come back to it and possible get more and more each time. See it in a theater if you can.
Clearspace. App. I forget if I’ve recommended this, but I recently told a friend about it and he’s loving it. It’s the only app that has ever successfully gotten me to curb my social media habits and it’s changed my life a little. It’s $50 a year which is worth the time it saves me, but also you can get a free trial.
Andor. Television Show. Have I talked about Andor season 2 yet? I’m late to it and thought the first few episodes were a tiny bit slow, but I’m loving it. I really love that there are French resistance aliens who speak fake French and basically wear berets.
Alright! Here’s a mean comment someone left on a standup video of mine on reddit, and my witty retort:
Much love!
Stay well!
Julian!
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