EVERY SPOKEN WORD
150 min read · 30,306 words- 0:01 – 2:23
Cold open, Lauryn Hill shirt, and why golf is so hard
- NANarrator
(drumming) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out.
- CHColeman Hughes
The Joe Rogan Experience.
- JRJoe Rogan
Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night. All day. (heavy guitar music) Good to go? All right. Coleman, welcome. Nice to meet you.
- CHColeman Hughes
Great to be here, man.
- JRJoe Rogan
What is, what is X Factor? Is that your podcast?
- CHColeman Hughes
No, I wish. The X, X Factor, this is a Lauryn Hill shirt.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, I've seen you wear that on more than one occasion.
- CHColeman Hughes
You know, I just love this shirt.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, okay.
- CHColeman Hughes
It's comfortable. I look good in it, I feel good in it.
- JRJoe Rogan
You do look good in it.
- CHColeman Hughes
Thank you.
- JRJoe Rogan
You do look good in it. Um, I'm glad you agree with Jamie that golf is a problem.
- NANarrator
What kind of problem?
- JRJoe Rogan
This motherfucker-
- NANarrator
It's a good problem to have.
- JRJoe Rogan
All, all he cares about is golf these days.
- NANarrator
There's a lot going on in the golf world.
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- CHColeman Hughes
You know, I will say-
- NANarrator
A lot of money being thrown around.
- CHColeman Hughes
... I just, I resent golf because my dad is good, and I think he really wanted me to be good.
- NANarrator
Oh.
- CHColeman Hughes
At least I sensed that, and I never was. It's such an awkward swing.
- JRJoe Rogan
It's a very weird movement. I was watching Tiger Woods' swing on, uh, YouTube yesterday-
- NANarrator
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... for whatever strange reason.
- NANarrator
Interesting.
- CHColeman Hughes
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
'Cause they were talking about how... Look at me, I'm scared. I told you-
- 2:23 – 4:25
Long-drive golf, accuracy vs. power, and the frustration/etiquette problem
- NANarrator
I'm trying to find... This, this guy, he's a long drive hitter. I've s- he's pretty new to the-
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs) Jack Deius.
- NANarrator
... thing. He's huge. He was a baseball player, but he's got this very unique swing. He calls it the Novak swing. He does a giant baseball step, but he fucking-
- CHColeman Hughes
Happy Gilmore swing?
- NANarrator
... he blasts the ball, too.
- CHColeman Hughes
Oh, my God.
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs) Oh, Jesus Christ.
- NANarrator
He just rips it. Yeah. But, yeah, I've tried doing it. It really fucks up your entire swing for everything else you're doing. It's, it's only made for hitting the ball as far as possible, which is...
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah, you can't putt like that.
- JRJoe Rogan
But can you make it accurate and do that?
- NANarrator
Y- you can 'cause the long drive thing, you have to hit it within the fairway. You can't just smash it as far as possible and count as far as it went. It has to be within, like, the lines kind of thing.
- JRJoe Rogan
I can't imagine that there isn't some, like, giant linebacker type dude that if you could taught, teach him correctly, that he would have immense power. Like, could you imagine if you could teach Francis Ngannou how to drive correctly? That ball might never land. (laughs)
- NANarrator
Well, there's a picture of Tyson Fury swinging, which I think he's pretty new to it, and he's a giant person.
- JRJoe Rogan
He's enormous.
- NANarrator
It's the same kind of thing.
- JRJoe Rogan
The amount of, the amount of torque.
- NANarrator
Like-
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- NANarrator
... he's, it doesn't look as impressive. You also don't have... The other part, which is, I've been figuring out as I learned, swinging as hard as you can doesn't make the ball go as far as it will as if you swing nice and soft and hit it in the right spot on the club.
- JRJoe Rogan
That's the same-
- NANarrator
Which is-
- JRJoe Rogan
... thing with pool.
- NANarrator
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
Like, with a break shot in pool, you don't want to hit it as hard as you can. You want to kind of hit it smooth.
- NANarrator
It's, it's strange, but that doesn't get out your frustration of hitting a bad shot, which feels good too. I kind of think breaking a club over your leg when you had a b- bad, bad shot might be very helpful, but it's not etiquette. That's terrible etiquette.
- JRJoe Rogan
Why would it be helpful to break a club over your leg?
- NANarrator
It would feel good to get out that, like... 'Cause some people want to throw the club or throw a ball when you, when you do bad.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah?
- NANarrator
'Cause you, you're frustrated with yourself. It's all about yourself. You can't get, yell at yourself. There's players that have gotten in trouble for that because they catch it on mic. With, like, you've, I think you did it on mic.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right, right, right, right. Yeah.
- 4:25 – 6:47
Who is Tyson Fury? Boxing, body types, and bare-knuckle fight culture
- JRJoe Rogan
I got a theory about why people like Tyson Fury. It's not just 'cause he's awesome, but also 'cause he has back fat. That-
- CHColeman Hughes
I have no idea who Tyson Fury is.
- JRJoe Rogan
You don't know who Tyson Fury is?
- CHColeman Hughes
No.
- NANarrator
Really?
- CHColeman Hughes
No.
- JRJoe Rogan
He's the heavyweight champion of the world.
- CHColeman Hughes
I don't follow it.
- JRJoe Rogan
You don't know who Tyson Fury is?
- CHColeman Hughes
No.
- JRJoe Rogan
He's one of the most extraordinary heavyweight boxers ever.
- CHColeman Hughes
Okay.
- JRJoe Rogan
He's six foot nine. He's a gypsy, and he's a fucking character. They call him the Gypsy King.
- CHColeman Hughes
Wow.
- JRJoe Rogan
He was very fat at one point in time, and then he got pretty thin. But he's still, in between fights in particular, he carries a lot of back fat, like that.
- CHColeman Hughes
He does not look quick or particularly strong.
- JRJoe Rogan
Dude, he's amazing.
- CHColeman Hughes
It's interesting.
- JRJoe Rogan
It's all deceptive. First of all-
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... he's huge. He's so tall. I mean, he's six foot nine. And he just has an immense reach, immense reach, and he's very talented.
- CHColeman Hughes
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
Like, it's not just a physical advantage. You know, those gypsies, like, I don't know if you've ever seen any of those, um, documentaries on bare knuckle boxers.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-mm.
- JRJoe Rogan
Bare knuckle boxers in the UK, it's like the, these gypsies from, like, Brad Pitt in Snatch. Did you ever see that movie?
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-mm.
- JRJoe Rogan
You didn't?
- CHColeman Hughes
No.
- JRJoe Rogan
Are you just reading books all the time?
- CHColeman Hughes
(laughs)
- 6:47 – 10:55
The danger of one punch: accidental deaths, fainting falls, and head trauma stories
- CHColeman Hughes
Have you seen this documentary, One Punch?
- JRJoe Rogan
No.
- CHColeman Hughes
One Punch is a collection of stories of people who have killed someone accidentally with one punch.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, wow.
- CHColeman Hughes
Bar fight, single punch, they fall down, hit their head on-
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm-hmm.
- CHColeman Hughes
... a curb, the side of a table, and they die. And it goes through their legal stories, how they got in the fight. And it's just this fascinating recalibration of, uh, what you think is possible with a small amount of violence. Like, you never think if you're gonna punch someone once that they're gonna die.
- JRJoe Rogan
I think that.
- CHColeman Hughes
May- maybe you do, but 'cause you're-
- JRJoe Rogan
I try to tell people that all the time.
- CHColeman Hughes
You're- you're very close to violence. But, um, I think people who aren't close to it don't realize how quickly things can spin outta control.
- JRJoe Rogan
The thing is the hitting the head. And this is, uh... Apparently, this was in Bob Saget's, uh, autopsy. They believe that he blacked out and fell back and hit his head.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm.
- JRJoe Rogan
And that is, uh, what caused massive skull fractures in his head. And, you know, some people think, like, "Oh, my God. Maybe foul play was involved." But apparently, there's no way. Apparently, the, um, door, you know, he had a keycard to get into the door of the hotel. No one had been in it since he had been in there. No one had left. So, he opened the door, he went inside. And, you know, he was... He'd just done a show.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm.
- JRJoe Rogan
And apparently, he just fainted and banged the back of his head. And then there's a video, I don't know if you ever see the-
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah, yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... Heather McDonald video?
- CHColeman Hughes
Uh, the- the writer, Heather McDonald?
- JRJoe Rogan
No, the comedian, Heather McDonald.
- CHColeman Hughes
Oh, okay.
- JRJoe Rogan
Have you seen the video of her?
- CHColeman Hughes
No, no.
- JRJoe Rogan
See if you can find that. You- you... Well, you definitely can find it, it's everywhere. She's on stage and it's kind of... It's the craziest video-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... because people think it's a joke.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
She's talking about how many vaccines she's had. She's like, "I'm double vaxxed, I'm boosted, I got the shingles vaccine."
- CHColeman Hughes
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
You know, and like... And- and she, right after saying that, blacks out on stage, falls back completely, bangs her head off the ground, and which is how people die. So, give me some volume on this from the beginning.
- 10:55 – 15:26
Moral luck, intent, and why outcomes don’t equal moral character
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah, the- the philosophers call this moral luck.
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm.
- CHColeman Hughes
Right? It's like, um, we both commit the same action. I punch someone, you punch someone. One of these person has a prior medical condition, or just by pure dumb luck, ends up tripping, hitting their head. So, we both did the same exact action. One of us committed homicide, one of us got into a bar fight.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
That doesn't actually speak to which one of us is a more moral human being. That's pure dumb luck. But the law can treat it as if you're a murderer and you're not, right? That's moral luck. I think it's a very interesting concept. Texting while driving is another example. I've done it. I don't do it, you know, as a- as a- as a rule, but, like, I've done it in the past. Almost everyone has. You know, there- there's someone in the world where the first time they texted and drove, they ran over, like, a five-year-old.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
Law of averages says that must've happened.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
And, um, on the one hand, we wanna punish those things. On the other hand, you can't really call that person a moral monster when they're doing something a lot of people are doing and just being... Getting much luckier with. Right?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, there's an interesting distinction between someone choosing to do something evil versus an evil result.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
Like, if your son dies because someone was texting and driving, it's the most horrible...... feeling. You'd probably be so furious and you'd want revenge. You'd wanna punish that person. But it's not that they did it on purpose. The difference between someone killing your son on purpose-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... that's, that's an evil act. This is just thoughtless and shit luck, and also not anticipating consequences.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm. And that's why the law recognizes intention as a factor that distinguishes, say, one murder from a worse murder, right?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
And, um, I think the reason we recognize intention in the law is 'cause clearly all human beings, we have this intuition that there's a dif- it's a different type of person who does a thing on purpose than does it by accident. Uh, one kind of person wishes you harm and probably will keep wishing you harm. The other, the other kind of person, at worst, was negligent. And I think there is, um... I think that's a very important observation to hold steady throughout our, uh, legal and non-legal judgments of people just in the culture, right? Like, people want to eliminate the distinction between, uh, you know, saying, uh, for instance, a racial slur, directing it at someone, and say- saying the word in quotation marks, right?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
And I, I know that you're familiar with the fact that people erase the distinction between those two things.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, I'm very familiar. (laughs)
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah. I'm not that clueless that I haven't been paying attention to what's, what's going on.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
But the point is, the same principle by which we all understand the difference between manslaughter and homicide and so forth should govern the way that we judge people for, you know, words and e- everything else, right? But c- certain people wanna say intentions don't matter. Uh, that, that just... That can't make sense. You know, you'd have to throw out our whole legal system if that were true, o- or at least overhaul it. And I think that's an important principle to recognize.
- JRJoe Rogan
I think the, the conversations haven't been had enough, whether it is with, uh, someone doing something accidentally and having a horrible result ve- versus doing it intentionally, or someone using words versus someone that is actually trying to be racist.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
There's, uh, there's definitely a difference in those things. And I think we, as a society, we have rules that we've decided upon. And then when someone violates those rules, that person is a violator, and that person needs to be judged and dealt with because of that.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
I think we have this sort of moral righteousness when it comes to uttering certain words or doing certain things. And the, the good thing about the, the judgment that comes out of that and the inter- is, is conversations. It's like people start having conversations like, "W- what is the difference? Why is it different?"
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
Like, "What are you allowed to say? What are you not allowed to say and why?"
- 15:26 – 23:16
OJ Simpson, the N-word tape, and how progressive arguments shifted over time
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm. You know, it's interesting with, with the N-word controversy that, that happened here. Right when that was happening, I was watching for the first time ever, I'm ashamed to admit, the five-part OJ documentary from ESPN from-
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- CHColeman Hughes
... from a while back. It's like, it's been on my list to watch for a long time. I finally watched it. And you'll remember, there's this moment in the trial where, uh, you know, i- it's now known that there's probably, um, a Mark Fuhrman N-word tape, you know, like this, this cop-
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- CHColeman Hughes
... that, uh, f- collected the glove at the scene, has a history of using the N-word as a racial slur, directing it at, at, at people and so forth. And Chris Darden for the pro- prosecution, with the jury out of the room, he looks at the judge, he says, "We cannot allow the jury to hear this tape, and here's why. Black people cannot hear the N-word and remain objective. And the jurors, they have to remain objective. So, we can't, we can't allow them to hear. We can't admit this as evidence."
- JRJoe Rogan
That's fascinating that he's the prosecuting attorney.
- CHColeman Hughes
The prosecuting attorney, made that argument. And then the defense, Johnny Cochran came back on the defense and he said, "What the hell are you talking about? The idea that a Black person can't hear the N-word in any context and remain rational, remain objective, um, understand the context of it, is patronizing, it's condescending, it's racist. I'm ashamed that you made this argument," right? And, you know, regardless of the merits of it, th- his, Johnny Cochran's view was seen to have sort of won the day among, among people, and they did admit, um, much of, um, or at least parts of the tape, and the jury heard the word. And basically, the argument was, among progressive people at that time in the '90s, was, it's condescending and patronizing to say that every ex- like, any example of that word being spoken just, like, scrambles Black people's minds or something. And I think there's been a huge sea change in what the prov- progressive argument now is. The progressive argument now is much closer to Chris Darden's point of view that any example of this word being used, whether it's in quotation marks, um, whether you're talking about the word itself, or whether it's being hurled as an insult, it's all the same. It's all so deeply, uh, you know, shattering of the, the inner psyche of a Black person. Um, so I just... I think we, at, at minimum, we should mark how much has changed there and who was making these arguments back then and who's making them now. Um, and I worry that people are basically circling the wagon on an idea that they haven't really thought through, if that makes any sense.
- JRJoe Rogan
The Darden thing, uh, I, I get it from a prosecutor's perspective-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... because he doesn't want them to dismiss...... this, this character in his case, which is Mark Fuhrman, who on top of that also has been accused of planting evidence.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
So, there's like a two thing going on with Mark Fuhrman. You're dismissing his validity, first of all, because he's doing something illegal.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
He's planting evidence.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
And then, and he might have planted blood too, right? Wasn't that... wasn't... didn't they think-
- CHColeman Hughes
It was, it was alleged, or, yeah, people were wondering.
- JRJoe Rogan
And then, on top of that, he might have, he might have racist perspectives.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
So, like you've got two things going on simultaneously. And then also, it's like everybody had seen the Rodney King video.
- CHColeman Hughes
Yes.
- JRJoe Rogan
This was a big part of the O.J. case that a lot of people-
- CHColeman Hughes
Huge part.
- JRJoe Rogan
... maybe have, um, forgotten.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
But when people saw that Rodney King video, which is really one of the first viral videos-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... and you see Rodney King on the ground, and these multiple white cops beating him with sticks, i- and the fact that those cops got off-
- CHColeman Hughes
For no possible reason.
- JRJoe Rogan
It's... well, what was the f- what was the story? That he was running from them, and he was on PCP, or something like that?
- 23:16 – 27:40
Smartphones, viral police videos, and why rarity can feel like ubiquity
- CHColeman Hughes
Imagine how many Rodney Kings there were that just didn't get filmed.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
And this is... I mean, we now live in an age, just in the past 10 years really, where everyone in America virtually has a fairly high definition camera in their pockets at all times. And some police departments have moved to universal body cams and- and so forth. And that's been... uh, I think that's changed incentives, uh, you know, almost more than any law that we pass could, right?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
The- the understanding every cop has, that when he or she is policing the public, the public can simply whip out their phones a- at any time, has... I mean, that has to seep into the consciousness of- of police officers, knowing that they're being watched. And, you know, that's a double-edged sword though, 'cause on the one hand, um, it's way harder for a cop to abuse someone, uh, now, now that everyone can- can film. Um, on the other hand, because everyone has a phone in their pocket, the availability of bad things happening-... has just skyrocketed.
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm.
- CHColeman Hughes
Right?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
And in a country with over 300 million people, it gives us the impression that horrible things that are actually extremely rare are in fact happening all the time.
- JRJoe Rogan
Just by numbers.
- CHColeman Hughes
Just by numbers.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
And, I mean, the way I think about this is, for instance, if we talk about, uh, unarmed civilians getting killed by the cops. Um, unarmed citizens. If America were exactly the same, but the size of Canada, like, you know, one ninth the population, it would mean that we would have roughly one ninth the, you know, interactions between cops and, and, and, and cit- citizens, and o- one ninth of the opportunities for, for things to go left, and, uh, one ninth of the videos, um, of, of cops killing people, unarmed. And it would seem like it were happening a lot less. But in fact, the state of the country would be the same, right? So like just the fact that we have such a large population makes it feel like lightning strike rarity events are happening all the time.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
And the media obviously thrives on that.
- JRJoe Rogan
Well, those are the ones that are very popular, and those are the ones that, um, people want to share. But there's a lot of those... there's a lot of ones with cops getting attacked too, and people don't seem to care about those.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
There's a, a website that I follow, a Twitter pa- uh, Instagram page rather, called Police Posts.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm.
- JRJoe Rogan
Go to, uh, Police Posts. There's one that they put up today about this guy, um, responding to a call and, uh, this, uh, man is at the door and the cop is walking towards the door and the guy is saying, "Hurry up. She's choking on her own blood." Something to that extent.
- CHColeman Hughes
Is it?
- JRJoe Rogan
Here, yeah. Play this.
- CHColeman Hughes
Uh...
- JRJoe Rogan
See, do it from the beginning so that you could see. The, no, do, do, do it from the beginning-
- CHColeman Hughes
All right, all right. I will, I will.
- JRJoe Rogan
... because otherwise it's gonna fuck it all up.
- CHColeman Hughes
I will.
- JRJoe Rogan
Okay, here. Give me some volume. All right, here we go. No! So the suspect's saying, "Come on, come on." No, no, no, bro. "She's choking on her blood." No! "Come on." Who's all in the house? So the guy's walking towards the door. Who's all in the house?
- NANarrator
Me. (gun firing)
- JRJoe Rogan
Ah! Get down! Hey! Just... Hey! (gun firing) So as the guy's walking towards the house- 9-8-9! 9-8-9! I've been shot! 9-8-9! As the guy's walking towards the house, the guy is standing in the... You can play it again. The guy is standing in the middle of the door- No! No, no, no, bro. No, no, no, bro. No! ... and he's got no shirt on and he's saying, "Come on." Who's all in the house? You know, "She's choking on her own blood." Who's all in the house?
- 27:40 – 46:50
American policing vs. Europe: guns, training, panic, and the case for BJJ
- CHColeman Hughes
So, this is the point I tried to make during the year of the George Floyd protests and riots. People would often say, "Well, look at Western Europe, look at Canada, look at all of these places, uh, where they have cops and, and in certain of these places, the cops don't have guns. Some- sometimes they do. How come you're not seeing video... how come it's only in America that we're seeing videos of cops killing unarmed people?" Right?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
And, uh, I mean, I think there- there's a serious conversation to have, to be had about the culture of the American police being, being seriously flawed. Uh, at the same time, the fact that this happens in America means that policing in America is not the same as it, as policing in, in, in the UK and other countries, right? America's a country with more guns than people, and, uh, that fact alone means that when a cop pulls over a suspect in America as opposed to an... almost any other nation, or, or any of, other, our, our peer nations, they have a little thought in the back of their mind that is reasonable, which says, "The thing he's reaching into his pocket for could be a gun. Could be a wallet, but it could be a gun." In other countries, cops don't really have to have that thought because it's always a wallet. And, and that's a, that's a systematic difference between policing in America and policing in, in other nations that makes it harder and makes it, um, makes it a facile comparison to simply say, "Why isn't this stuff happening in Western Europe?"
- JRJoe Rogan
There's that, but then there's also the history of police violence and abusive police officers-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... in America that's different than the history of cops in any other place. And I think that that has to be taken into account too, that there's an enemy, uh, perspective that a lot of people have. When they look at the cops, they think of the cops as the enemy.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
I don't necessarily know what it's like in Europe, but I've got to think that the polarization between cops and citizens and a lot of it is-
- CHColeman Hughes
(clears throat)
- JRJoe Rogan
... uh, you know, broadcast via these cellphone videos. Like the George Floyd incident, it was a girl, a 17-year-old girl filmed it on her cellphone.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
Changed the whole world-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... because of that video.
- CHColeman Hughes
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
Literally changed the, the landscape of r- of th- the way people think about racial interactions in America-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... because of one video.
- CHColeman Hughes
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
There's so many people that think of cops as the enemy because of these videos. And there's so many of these videos. If you look at...... the perspective that people had, you know, um, my parents were hippies in the '60s, and, you know, they grew up during the Civil Rights Movement, and they were around during, you know, marches and protests. And when Muhammad Ali refused to go to fight in Vietnam, and they stripped him of his title, and there was, there was this understanding of the difference between the way cops treated Black people versus cops treated white people. But it wasn't on YouTube.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
It wasn't available in your fa- so tha- this data that you're talking about, tha- that's disproportionate because there's so many bad ones, even if there's millions and millions of interactions, it only takes one that becomes viral that will change people's opinions.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
One Eric Garner.
- CHColeman Hughes
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
You know, one George Floyd, one video that changes people's perspective on how... what, what goes down between cops and citizens and what is wrong with the cops. This, this didn't exist before. And so when you see videos like this where this guy who's a cop gets shot at and you see, you know, these other interactions, like, we're, we're not getting, like, necessarily a balanced perspective. There's clearly a problem in the way cops deal with all citizens. There's clearly, uh, there's a, there's clearly a culture of abli- abusive police officers in some precincts, in some place.
- CHColeman Hughes
100%. I mean-
- JRJoe Rogan
100%.
- CHColeman Hughes
I, I, I remember... It's fresh in my mind 'cause I saw the, the O.J. documentary, but there was, um, th- there was some tape that was released of cops, like, privately talking about Black people, and they had some horrible name, I, I can't remember what it was, but that they thought was hilarious, right? Uh, and it just... It was this, this moment where it was just... it was perfectly clear that they saw themselves as one kind of people, and they saw their selves that they were... the, the people they were policing as a totally different set of people, unlike them. Um, and that was almost, you know, psychologically akin to the relationship of, of colonialism in, in some way. Um, but, but I do want to... I mean, the, the way the media has portrayed this issue in, in recent years, uh, has been to skew the discussion of shootings so as to only show the Black victims of these kinds of, uh, of these kinds of killings, right? I, I wrote a long essay, uh, in 2020, and one of the points I was trying to make in that essay was, uh, you know, unarmed white people get killed by the cops every year in circumstances identical to the ones that we see, uh, unarmed Black people getting killed. That doesn't mean racism doesn't exist. I think the, the, the majority of racism m- almost certainly occurs in the kind of non-deadly interactions and harassments and racial profiling of people, but if we're talking narrowly about killing unarmed civilians, you know, I took as an... uh, just as a, as an experiment to show how often this happens, I took a single year. I, I closed my eyes and picked it at random, and I picked 2015 and just listed 10 different unarmed white people that got shot by the cops, uh, and killed that year. Most of the cops got off. One of them is a six-year-old kid. And, um, you know, these are... you know, like, nobody knows these names because it only gets pumped into the national media when it's a Black person, which gives the false impression that it only happens to Black people, right? Like, everyone knows the, the name George Floyd, as they should. Uh, but, uh, very few people know the name Tony Timpa, I found, which is this guy from Dallas in 2017 that was killed on camera with a knee on the top of his neck for 13 minutes and the cops joking the whole time. It was the closest example to a George Floyd that, um, that, that I'm aware of in, in recent American history.
- JRJoe Rogan
This is on video?
- 46:50 – 57:08
Rickson Gracie, yoga breathing, and discomfort tolerance (cold plunge & tank)
- CHColeman Hughes
Me and my girlfriend, a couple weeks ago, we watched the, uh, Rickson Gracie documentary on YouTube.
- JRJoe Rogan
Rickson.
- CHColeman Hughes
Rickson.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah, that's right. That's right.
- JRJoe Rogan
R, Portuguese yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
Right, right.
- JRJoe Rogan
Choke.
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah. Choke, yep.
- JRJoe Rogan
It's amazing.
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah, that's right, that guy is.
- JRJoe Rogan
It's one of the greatest documentaries of all time.
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
He was-
- CHColeman Hughes
So good.
- JRJoe Rogan
And still is, very unique.
- CHColeman Hughes
(clears throat)
- JRJoe Rogan
Very unique. Uh, it's an honor to know him. And ... But, um, Rickson was very unique because he had all the things. He had ... First of all, his father was Helio Gracie, who was the, one of the most important figures in the history of martial arts.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
He was the guy who was a small man. He only weighed, like, 147 pounds, and he was out there having these no-rules fights with these big giant guys-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... and he relied completely on technique and leverage, and developed this system of technique and leverage as applied to the ground game with, uh, Carlos Gracie and with, uh, a bunch of the other people like Carlson and a few of these other, like, early jujitsu practitioners.
- CHColeman Hughes
(clears throat)
- JRJoe Rogan
So he gave birth or, you know, he fathered, rather, Rickson. And Rickson was unique in that he grew up with it and also that he was very physically powerful.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
He was unusual in that he got really obsessed with yoga.
- CHColeman Hughes
Yep.
- JRJoe Rogan
So he had incredible flexibility. He was obsessed with breathing, so he had this incredible control of his breath and control of his mind because of that. And he would do, like, cold water immersion where he would get into, like ... That's that scene in the, in the film where he gets into this freezing-
- CHColeman Hughes
(clears throat)
- JRJoe Rogan
... glacial river in Japan-
- 57:08 – 1:09:57
Deplatforming, Nazis-as-test-case, and why censorship backfires
- JRJoe Rogan
Do you just ... I mean, we're in ... We were talking before about the, uh, Brazilian version of me today-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... uh, before the show, where Glenn Greenwald had, uh, set me hip to this guy. I don't know his name, um, but he is a Brazilian podcaster who's very popular, and, uh, he likes to do his shows intoxicated, like I do. And, uh, apparently Glenn said that what he said was he doesn't believe anybody should be deplatformed, and he said, uh ... And someone said, like, "Including Nazis?" And he said, "Yeah, I don't think you should deplatform Nazis," which, as we were saying before, was, like, the original position of the ACLU.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
The ACLU, which a lot of them are, like, Jewish attorneys, were, they were saying, "No, y- we shouldn't deplatform Nazis," and this is, like, 30 years after the Holocaust, right?
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
Fresh in our mind. So, for us today, I mean, you're ... This is, like, 1990. Imagine if the Holocaust was in the '90s.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
And then today in 2022, we're saying, "No, you shouldn't deplatform Nazis." And so this guy was saying, "I don't think you should deplatform Nazis," and, you know, "I don't think you should deplatform anybody," and so a bunch of people started saying, "He's a Nazi." And he was saying, "That's not what I'm saying," and they kicked him off of his platform. YouTube apparently won't let him ... He still has a YouTube account, but YouTube won't let him start a new account, and, uh, people want him deplatformed off of everything, and whatever platform he was on where he was getting paid for his podcast, he got fired from.
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah. I mean-
- JRJoe Rogan
Here's ... What is this guy's name?
- CHColeman Hughes
Bruno ... Bruno ... There we go. Ai- Ayub? I don't know how to say that.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah. Okay, well, it says it right here. Three years ago, video game streamer Bruno Ayub decided to start a new podcast, Flow, modeled on The Joe Rogan Experience. Okay, he said, uh, "Man, it'd be really cool if I did that in Brazil since nobody else has." Told The New York Times he interviews comedians, academics, government officials, ufologists, drinking alcohol and smoking weed. It's the exact same show. This motherfucker, he stole my show.
- CHColeman Hughes
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
Anyway-
- CHColeman Hughes
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
... his meteoric rise is due in no small part to model developed by his hero, as he learned last week. Aping Rogan comes with a risk. February 7th conversation, the two members of the Brazilian Congress, Ayub ... I hope I'm not saying his name wrong ... argued that Brazil should embrace free speech absolutism, including legalizing the currently illegal Nazi party. He said, "In my opinion, the radical left has much more space than the radical right," he told his approximately 3.6 million YouTube subscribers. "Both should be given space. I am crazier than all of you. I think that a Nazi should have a Nazi party recognized by law." He added, "If someone wants to be anti-Jewish, I think he has the right to be." Ayub woke up Tuesday to thousands of people calling him a Nazi on social media. Sponsors pulled funding, and government ... The government opened an investigation into the alleged offense of Nazi apologism. Uh, and his podcast production company announced they will be severing ties with the 31-year-old provocateur. So, there you go.
- CHColeman Hughes
I mean, censorship just almost never works, right? Like, every one of the major ideas that rule our world right now, right? Let's say the right loves Christianity. The left is, you know, largely secular. Both of those ideas have, at different points in history, been highly censored.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
Right? Like, Christianity was highly censored at one point. Later it became the law of, of the Roman Empire. Um, atheism through- I mean, has been heavily censored on pain of death for hundreds and hundreds of years and now it's rather mainstream. I mean, those are big examples of censorship not working in the, in the grand arc of history, but we also have just very recent examples, you know. Lab leak-... you know, regardless of what you think about it, and I, I think it's probably true, but regardless of what you think about it, what's clear is that the attempts to brand it as misinformation did not work in terms of getting people not to believe it. This-
- JRJoe Rogan
It worked for a small amount of time-
- CHColeman Hughes
For... Exactly.
- JRJoe Rogan
... to get people off social media-
- CHColeman Hughes
For how long? About a-
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
... what? A year?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah. It was enough, though. It was enough that-
- CHColeman Hughes
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
... in many people's eyes, that became a taboo subject that was very-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- 1:09:57 – 1:18:58
Persuasion works (often in private): ego, reputation, and changing your mind
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah, I, I think that happens a lot. That happens more than... I mean, like, Daryl Davis i- is amazing and i- exceptional in many ways, but I think that those kinds of changes of heart are actually far more common than you might suppose, just kind of observing the tenor of the media in our times. Like I was just talking to my, my friend Noam Dormon, who owns, owns A Comedy Cellar, and he's Jewish. And he has, he, he said over the years he's had a lot of Arab people working for him, coming from Arab countries where they've never met a Jew and have crazy ideas about Jews, like insane. And, you know, he was like, "I would never use that as a reason not to hire somebody, of course." And he, he's like a very pro-Israel guy too. He's very, very proud of being Jewish. But he, they become friends, and their ideas about Jews change over time as a result of interactions.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
It's, it's not, uh, like, a- again, as exceptional as Daryl Davis is, it's not, uh, you know, that is, that kind of thing is happening by the millions in people's lives in ways that will never make it into the media, um, all the time. And that's another reason why people underestimate, uh, others' ability to, to change their ideas. I mean, there's this-
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- CHColeman Hughes
... I've heard people argue that, you know, persuasion is actually not a good strategy. Persuasion just doesn't work. And, um, you know, I think that's, that's just not true, you know? What is true is that people very rarely change their opinions in real time on camera on the shows that you're watching.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- CHColeman Hughes
Because people, uh, myself included, have a vested interest in showing that we know what the fuck we're talking about. And, you know, you're, you're actually very unique in this way of, you know, if a guest shows you something and it's a fact you haven't seen and it contradicts your belief, you will often change your belief in real time, right? Like, that, no one does that. So people watching the media get this perception that, "Well, no one's ever changing their mind, everyone's just set in their ways," but I think the truth is people are changing their minds all the time in private by listening to podcasts by themselves, by watching stuff by themselves, where they don't pay a reputational price for changing their mind. So just because we rarely see evidence of people changing their minds through persuasion doesn't mean it's not happening all the time.
- JRJoe Rogan
It happens all the time. Um, it, it happens through experience and hopefully it happens because the person is capable of recognizing their flaws. The real problem comes when someone has a belief that's-... it's not accurate, and you stick to it anyway-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... because you don't want to lose.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
And that's a giant problem.
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
And in my mind, that's a tremendous weakness.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
And I don't like finding weakness in me.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
When I find a weakness in me, I eradicate it.
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
I find it, and I go, "Okay, that's a flaw."
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
That's why I change my opinion in real time-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... because I refuse to support an opinion or a, an, a false idea that I have espoused. And I, I ve- I refuse to connect my mind with ideas. My mind is not... I... Whatever idea, whatever fact that I s- I think is true, if that fact turns out to be incorrect, I will abandon it immediately if I can.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
A- a- as long as I'm, as long as I'm sure.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
I think you have to. I don't think you're- you are your ideas. I think you are this thinking entity that is trying to solve as many problems as you can that are around you and that are involved in your life. And as soon as you are willing to commit to an idea that you know is incorrect, you've done yourself a massive disservice in service of your ego, which is the worst fucking thing that you could ever fuel. Like, you should never fuel your ego.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
It exists whether you like it or not. You should try to control it, and humble it, and to try to keep it to be... Uh, keep it, have it the least intrusive factor in your thought process. So, the moment the ego gets challenged, you have to be able to accurately assess whether or not the information that you've clung to is valid.
- 1:18:58 – 1:45:37
Ignored suffering: crime, poverty, media incentives, and intergenerational traps
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah, I think... So when it comes to th- these places that have just had intergenerational poverty, intergenerational v- violence, intergenerational single parent homes-
- JRJoe Rogan
Redlining laws.
- CHColeman Hughes
... and chaos. Yeah. Um, I mean, the, the equilibrium we're at, at the country, i- in the country right now seems really dysfunctional to me because basically what you have is, um, you know, you have a right-wing media that will... The- they will talk about things like, uh, you know, the constant drive-by shootings and kids getting caught, uh, you know, usually Black kids getting caught in the crossfire. And th- they'll talk about the insane homicide rate for, for young Black men, which is the number one cause of death for, for Black men in their 20s. But they'll do it in a way where you know it's about political point scoring, right? It's like when Tucker Carlson talks about, you know, Black on Black crime and the problem with homicide, you don't get the sense that he's deeply motivated to actually focus on this and, and rebuild these communities. Um, and you know, maybe I'm slandering his motives, but, uh, I think, uh, you know, one doesn't get... One gets a sense that the first purpose of raising those points is to point the finger at, at Democrats, Democrat-controlled cities and, uh, you know, just partisan point scoring, right? And so that's what you have on the right basically. And what we have on the left is anyone who mentions these problems, right? You mention the fact that homicide is the number one cause of death for, for Black men in their 20s and for no other race of men. A- and you try to tug at people's heartstrings for these stories of, you know, little girls dressed up in, in bumblebee costumes for, for Halloween getting caught in the crossfire and the wider consequences of growing up in such environments, how it dooms kids, um, to, to failure and, and, and so forth. Um, you know, i- it's, it's made difficult to acknowledge the reality of the issues and to talk about it in a common sense way without being accused of being a racist.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- CHColeman Hughes
Right? It's like y- "Oh, you're just talking about Black on Black crime. Um, if you're white, you're a racist. If you're Black, you're an Uncle Tom." And basically, we don't want to talk about it unless the cops did it, right? If the cops, if the cops kill a, kill a Black person, we will shut down everything, right?
- JRJoe Rogan
A good example is that guy who drove over that crowd of people at the Christmas parade in Wisconsin-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... and they were saying the accident caused by an SUV. They kept saying that because the perpetrator was a Black guy-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... and the Black guy who had just gotten out of jail, who had just gotten out of jail for trying to kill his, uh, his, I think his kid's mom, his, his girlfriend, trying to kill her with a car.
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
So he gets arrested, goes to jail, gets out on very low bail. I think it was like... I don't remember how much it was, but thousands of dollars, not much, and then plows over a whole group of people. And the coverage was bizarre because, like, they were bending over backwards, they were doing mental gymnastics to try to not say, "This Black man-"
- CHColeman Hughes
That he was Black.
- JRJoe Rogan
"... drove over all these people-"
- CHColeman Hughes
Uh-huh.
- JRJoe Rogan
"... this, this random crowd of people." Because they didn't want to be accused of being racist-
- CHColeman Hughes
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... or they were woke or they were... You know, whate- for whatever, whatever their reason was-
- CHColeman Hughes
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... for whatever their ideology was for portraying the story in the way they did, that's how they w- decided to portray it.
- CHColeman Hughes
To me, the most eg- egregious example of this, and it was a total indictment of the state of our nation o- on the topic of race, um, and how much race thinking just warps people's morality. It was the, the Jasmine Barnes case from maybe three or four years ago. She was uh, a little girl in, in Houston, uh, that was killed. She was shot while in, in, in her mother's car, tragically, and at first they saw a guy in a, in a pickup truck seeming to flee the scene and it looked like a white guy. So basically this became... I- it was right around New Years, maybe 2019 I think, and it became a national manhunt. You had, you know, Shaun King raised $100,000 to, for any tips on, on who this guy was. They had a police sketch of a guy that kind of looked like you. (laughs)
Episode duration: 3:11:48
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Transcript of episode GIhHdL2fKiE
