Joe Rogan Experience #1898 - Neal Brennan

Joe Rogan 0:00 (drumming music) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out.

Narrator 0:04 The Joe Rogan Experience.

Joe Rogan 0:06 Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day. (heavier rock music) Can you handle this? (laughs)

Neal Brennan 0:12 Right. That's not, that's not physical. It's like, can you handle being in a incredibly abstract place and your brain doing shit it's never done before?

Joe Rogan 0:23 Yeah, that seems to be what happens when people can't handle it, is the, uh, just the resistance of it. Just like, "No, no, no." And then that's the bad trip.

Neal Brennan 0:34 Yeah, they say, like, surrender, and I've had ... I've had, you know, journeys, job. When you're in the medicine game as long as I've been in it-

Joe Rogan 0:45 The, the medicine game.

Neal Brennan 0:45 ... you can call it medicine, um-

Joe Rogan 0:47 Plant medicine.

Neal Brennan 0:48 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 0:48 Don't you im- Doesn't immediately red flags go up and you go-

Neal Brennan 0:50 I wanna punch myself in the face. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 0:51 ... "Oh my God, don't say plant medicine"?

Neal Brennan 0:52 Yeah, can't not say it. It's, uh, I- I'm wearing a fucking ayahuasca anklet as we speak, and I wanna-

Joe Rogan 0:59 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 0:59 I wanna punch myself in the f- in the other side of the face.

Joe Rogan 1:03 There's so much jargon and lingo that goes with, like, psychedelic talk that leads to, like, cults. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:09 Yeah, it's not different at all. Did you watch the, um, the Orgasm, Inc. documentary on Netflix yet?

Joe Rogan 1:18 No.

Neal Brennan 1:18 It's about that one touch ... It's, uh, it's really funny, 'cause it's-

Joe Rogan 1:23 I heard it's great.

Neal Brennan 1:24 It's great. It's just, it all ... The same shit happens, it doesn't matter where. It's that ... I did a joke one time that, uh, every cult, at some point, the rel- the leader of every religious cult says, "Hey, God, uh, spoke to me, and he says I gotta fuck all your wives." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:43 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 1:44 Without fail.

Joe Rogan 1:45 Every one of them.

Neal Brennan 1:45 Every thi- every single-

Joe Rogan 1:47 Waco.

Neal Brennan 1:47 ... across the board.

Joe Rogan 1:47 All of them.

Neal Brennan 1:47 Wait, all of them.

Joe Rogan 1:48 All of them.

Neal Brennan 1:48 "Yeah, sorry guys, I got that call. Yeah, send your wife in. I'm gonna fuck her now. God decided now is the time." This one was different 'cause it's a female leader, but ... And it was based on orgasms, but it, this one was like, "You gotta fuck him-

Joe Rogan 2:02 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 2:02 ... if you're having a hard time." (laughs) It was like the opposite of HR, where it was, you know you should ... "If you have a problem with him, you gotta fuck him."

Joe Rogan 2:13 There's a place here that, uh, was a cult, and, uh, the building was for sale. I almost bought the building. I was, like, in negotiations

Narrator 2:20 Yeah, that's-

Neal Brennan 2:20 Oh, that's where you were gonna have the-

Joe Rogan 2:22 Yeah, that's-

Neal Brennan 2:22 ... club, right?

Joe Rogan 2:22 Yeah. It's, uh, the documentary's called Holy Hell.

Neal Brennan 2:26 I still haven't watched it. It's on my list.

Joe Rogan 2:28 It's fucking wild. It started out in, uh, Los Angeles, and, uh, this guy was, uh ... He would get his male, uh, disciples, and, uh, he would give them therapy, make them ch- pay for therapy. It was like 50 bucks.

Neal Brennan 2:44 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 2:44 And then he would fuck them all.

Neal Brennan 2:45 Another hallmark, yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:46 And then he would fuck them all.

Neal Brennan 2:46 So it's like pyramid scheme.

Joe Rogan 2:48 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 2:48 Yep, I gotta f- "Hey, bad news, I gotta fuck you."

Joe Rogan 2:51 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 2:52 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 2:52 It's part of the deal.

Neal Brennan 2:53 I don't know what to say. You wanna be in it?

Joe Rogan 2:54 To give you real therapy.

Neal Brennan 2:55 Part of the group or not?

Joe Rogan 2:56 Yeah. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 2:58 (laughs) And that's-

Joe Rogan 2:58 But it's just so sad, like, listening to these guys tell the story. It's like w- there's, there's some weird thing about human beings where they, uh, w- they gravitate towards a big leader, towards someone who claims they have the answers and seems very confident and can speak reasonably well. There's almost like a cheat code where people just, like, they get locked into that.

Neal Brennan 3:23 It feels like order.

Joe Rogan 3:24 Mm.

Neal Brennan 3:25 It just feels like order. If you go ... If somebody says, "I know," and they're tall. If ... First of all, if they're tall, that gets you, like, 60% of the way there. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 3:36 That helps.

Neal Brennan 3:37 If they're tall and says, "I know what we should do, huh?"

Joe Rogan 3:40 Good looking.

Neal Brennan 3:40 If they're charismatic, good looking, fit, uh, attractive to women, like, that'll ... It just makes you feel like a daddy's here.

Joe Rogan 3:50 Mm.

Neal Brennan 3:51 Some daddy's here, a different daddy. It's like, oh, all right, that's what people like about Trump. That's what people like about Obama, th- Any, most presidents are some form of that.

Joe Rogan 4:01 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 4:02 What ... Reagan.

Joe Rogan 4:03 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 4:04 Uh, certainly two termers. George W. Bush in a weird way. P- form of da- You know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 4:11 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 4:11 Like a sort of ... He, George Bush, George W. Bush guy walked like he had a fucking two-foot cock. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 4:21 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 4:21 Guy walked like he had t- he had the lever him for two dicks. That's how wide his gait was, and he said he used to practice it.

Joe Rogan 4:28 He practiced his gait?

Neal Brennan 4:29 George W. Bush used to practice his gait.

Joe Rogan 4:31 Come on. Really?

Neal Brennan 4:31 I swear. You can look it up. Yeah. He w- he would talk about it in interviews. (laughs) Like, what are the rules-

Joe Rogan 4:36 (laughs) Imagine walking around your house practicing your impressive walk.

Neal Brennan 4:40 Yeah. Well, that c- Can you imagine anyone more than him doing it?

Joe Rogan 4:44 No. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 4:44 He's like the exact guy that would do that. Like, "I'm gonna practice walk." Um, yeah. Uh-

Joe Rogan 4:51 "Bush's renewed confidence." This is 2005. "Some folks look at me and see a certain swagger, which in Texas is called walking." That's how President Bush described himself during his acceptance speech at last year's Republican National Convention in New York City. But for much of this year, the president seemed to have lost the t- ... Okay.

Narrator 5:11 Yeah, it's not about that, I guess.

Joe Rogan 5:11 It's just about-

Neal Brennan 5:12 Yeah, but do you ... It, uh ... I've seen other interviews where he talked about, like-

Joe Rogan 5:15 Talked about actually practicing his walk.

Neal Brennan 5:17 Yeah. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:18 Well, they're originally from Maine, you know? They're l- they're, like, kinda fake Texans.

Neal Brennan 5:22 Come on, Joe. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 5:23 Yeah, they were from Kennebunkport.

Neal Brennan 5:24 No, yeah, w- no, no. They're, like-

Joe Rogan 5:26 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 5:26 They couldn't be more blue blood.

Joe Rogan 5:27 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 5:28 His da- uh, George Bush Senior was head of the CIA.

Joe Rogan 5:31 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 5:32 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:32 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 5:33 Which is weird now. I wonder if that would help him now, politically. "I was the head of the CIA."

Joe Rogan 5:41 Uh, didn't hurt him then.

Neal Brennan 5:43 Didn't hurt him, but only one term.

Joe Rogan 5:45 Yeah, but that was because of, uh, what's his face? Uh, mah.

Neal Brennan 5:49 Perot, yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:49 Yeah, Ross Perot.

Neal Brennan 5:50 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:51 "I'll tell you what's going on."

Neal Brennan 5:53 Look at him. Fucking guy's crazy.

Joe Rogan 5:53 Yeah, that, that guy, he fucking threw the whole thing out the window, like, th- When, when he bought television n- time, like, prime time television time, he was like, "I'll just buy the whole hour," and gave the networks money so they could-

Neal Brennan 6:07 Yep.

Joe Rogan 6:07 ... run his speech and talk about how you're getting fucked by the IRS. People at home are like, "What the fuck?" It s- lit- literally was like one of the very first internet speeches-

Neal Brennan 6:16 Yeah, abs-Absolutely.

Joe Rogan 6:17 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 6:18 He made himself go viral, and he appealed to people that were not ... There's like a whole part of the country that's not spoken to-

Joe Rogan 6:30 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 6:30 ... by, I mean, m- mass media. Uh, you can call it liberal media. I don't even think, I think there's like a level that they just, people just don't wanna talk to him. It's like people that, that aren't especially rich or sophisticated or good, like any of the stuff that people think is great and they wanna, that advertisers wanna appeal to, they just ... And then Ross Perot was like, "Look here." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 6:55 Yeah. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 6:56 And it's like a beacon for people. It's like a siren tone, and people are like, "What? What's that?" This guy ... And that, by the way, a billionaire. And it's not about, people think it's about, he didn't seem like a billionaire. That's the, that was his like, that's Trump's appeal too.

Joe Rogan 7:12 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 7:12 Like he doesn't seem like a rich guy, like-

Joe Rogan 7:15 He seems like a regular guy.

Neal Brennan 7:17 That's funny, like Dr. Oz lost.

Joe Rogan 7:20 How?

Neal Brennan 7:21 'Cause, 'cause he seemed, he seemed like a liberal. Fetterman seemed like a conservative. He, by ... Because I think so much of it is just looks. You can speak to this yourself. People are against you 'cause you're fit. There are people that are like, "Fucking meathead." I'm like, "He's not a meathead." "Fucking yeah he is." It's 'cause you look, you just are f- you're f- people wouldn't believe that you and I are friends. Do you know what I mean? Like we're like a-

Joe Rogan 7:51 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 7:51 It's like when a turtle hangs out with a fucking python. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 7:58 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 7:58 And the turtle's just riding the top of a python. People go like, "How are they..." It's like we're, we're, uh, uh, unexpected animal friends. Um, the, uh ... So I just think it's so much of it is looks, so much, it's that-

Joe Rogan 8:10 A lot of it is, right? 'Cause it-

Neal Brennan 8:12 Way more than people would admit.

Joe Rogan 8:13 Anybody that saw the Fetterman debate would go, "Oh, this guy needs help, he shouldn't be-"

Neal Brennan 8:16 Couldn't watch, I literally couldn't watch it. I knew like that's gonna, it would, it feels cruel or something.

Joe Rogan 8:22 Yeah. It is cruel. It's cruel to put a guy in a position like that, who's recovering from a stroke. You're, you're not supposed to be under that kind of stress. Want coffee?

Neal Brennan 8:30 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 8:30 Drink coffee?

Neal Brennan 8:30 I do.

Joe Rogan 8:32 Want some?

Neal Brennan 8:32 I eat too much shit.

Joe Rogan 8:33 You put a lot of stuff in there?

Neal Brennan 8:34 I put all kinds of garbage.

Joe Rogan 8:35 What are ya, like a Starbucks guy?

Neal Brennan 8:36 I have Splenda, I have, uh-

Joe Rogan 8:37 Oh.

Neal Brennan 8:37 ... Joe, I got the app.

Joe Rogan 8:39 (laughs) The app.

Neal Brennan 8:40 Venti soy misto. I love an app.

Joe Rogan 8:43 Ah.

Neal Brennan 8:43 Um, yeah, I get their, pick it up.

Joe Rogan 8:45 Good milk?

Neal Brennan 8:45 Uh, by the way, if you were homeless, would you ever, wouldn't you just go grab food off the shelf at any of these Chipotle?

Joe Rogan 8:52 Yeah, I would s-

Neal Brennan 8:53 Immediately?

Joe Rogan 8:53 I would just go right to Starbucks.

Neal Brennan 8:54 Yep.

Joe Rogan 8:55 'Cause like s- you're allowed to go in there.

Neal Brennan 8:56 Yep. For cr-

Joe Rogan 8:57 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 8:57 And they go, "Who's you?" For Josh.

Joe Rogan 9:00 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 9:00 There's probably a Josh on the shelf.

Joe Rogan 9:01 Just walk in, grab it, walk out.

Neal Brennan 9:03 Grab it, go over to Chipotle.

Joe Rogan 9:04 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 9:04 Get your lunch.

Joe Rogan 9:05 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 9:06 Go to the park. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 9:07 I mean, it must happen constantly. But they, they're shutting Starbucks left and right because they're just inundated with homeless people.

Neal Brennan 9:14 Uh-huh. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 9:15 It's like when they kicked those Black guys out in Philadelphia, you remember?

Neal Brennan 9:19 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 9:19 Because the Giants stink. And then they decided they're not kicking anybody out of Starbucks ever. Even if you're not a, if you're not a paid customer, it's okay.

Neal Brennan 9:28 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 9:28 And then the homeless people went, "Great."

Neal Brennan 9:30 Yep. Say no more.

Joe Rogan 9:31 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 9:32 We'll be right there.

Joe Rogan 9:32 Isn't it wild though, that one decision ... How much did that one decision that that one manager make cost Starbucks, by changing their policy and allowing homeless people to just linger around smelling like shit and-

Neal Brennan 9:46 Did they officially change their policy?

Joe Rogan 9:48 Oh yeah, yeah, they officially changed it. Yeah. They've officially changed it.

Neal Brennan 9:50 Yeah, that's what they call an over-correction.

Joe Rogan 9:52 A giant one, yeah.

Neal Brennan 9:54 The, uh, I was, I read a thing last night that there's, it's like similar but different, where there's so many people quit working at hospitals that there's now incredibly long waits-

Joe Rogan 10:09 Mm.

Neal Brennan 10:09 ... at hospitals. Like now, and COVID's like low.

Joe Rogan 10:14 Well, they fired so many of them 'cause they wouldn't get vaccinated, all those people that-

Neal Brennan 10:17 No, uh, they, the, the thing I read said that 300,000 people quit.

Joe Rogan 10:21 Mm.

Neal Brennan 10:22 In the last, in 2020 and 2021.

Joe Rogan 10:25 Well, I'm sure there's that too.

Neal Brennan 10:27 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 10:27 I'm sure there's quitting too, but a lot of them just, they, they had the option, get vaccinated or lose your job. And they were like, "What, do you ... We went through this when there was no vaccine. We all got COVID, you fucks."

Neal Brennan 10:39 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 10:39 "We risked our lives. We're in here every day. And, and now you're gonna make us get vaccinated when there's no science behind it? We, we literally have antibodies that are seven times better than what you get from the vaccine, and you're making people get vaccinated. Just f- for what? For a virtue signal? For so you can d- tell everybody that everyone's vaccinated?" Like it, there's zero science behind that. And they all, like these were our heroes that were on the front lines, and then they fired them.

Neal Brennan 11:05 If you were the, if you were the king of the earth, or let's say king of America.

Joe Rogan 11:10 Mm-hmm.

Neal Brennan 11:11 Which some would say you are. Uh, if you were (laughs) the king of America, what, how would you have handled COVID? From February 2020, like what would you have done? 'Cause I, I feel like we all have like, "I don't like that. I don't like that. I don't like that." I don't know what the better solution would've been. Especially when you consider stuff like hospitals and quitting and deaths-

Joe Rogan 11:34 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 11:34 ... and triage, like where in, at one point Wuhan was gonna buil- they built that hospital in a week, which America just can't do shit like that.

Joe Rogan 11:42 Right. Well-

Neal Brennan 11:42 To me it was always a hospital bed issue.

Joe Rogan 11:47 Well, it, uh, in some ways. The, the, the problem, it's, it's a health issue, right? And you're dealing with vast swaths of the population that have very fragile bodies, very fragile health.

Neal Brennan 12:00 Bad, people that are in bad health.

Joe Rogan 12:02 Yeah. They're in bad health.

Neal Brennan 12:02 Naturally in bad health.

Joe Rogan 12:03 That's a lot of people.

Neal Brennan 12:04 Who have never cared ... It's, I would say it, what is it, 45% of Americans are obese?

Joe Rogan 12:09 Yeah, something like that, somewhere in the neighborhood. And, you know, and that's just obesity.

Neal Brennan 12:15 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 12:15 Then you have these people that maybe they're not obese, but they have terrible blood plush- blood pressure, and they eat terrible food.

Neal Brennan 12:22 Yeah, hypertension, yeah.

Joe Rogan 12:23 Their immune system's shot. You know?

Neal Brennan 12:25 Diabetes, yep.

Joe Rogan 12:25 There's a lot of fucked up people in this country. And that was what was exposed by COVID. No matter what anybody did, it was gonna be bad for those people.... that there is no if, ands, or buts about it. No matter what anybody did, that disease was gonna wreck people with damaged immune systems. It was just, and especially overweight people.

Neal Brennan 12:43 A plurality of people.

Joe Rogan 12:44 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 12:44 Almost half. To say nothing of just old people.

Joe Rogan 12:47 Right, of course.

Neal Brennan 12:48 I would argue there's more, let's go 60/40 unhealthy to healthy in America. You could almost go 70/30.

Joe Rogan 12:54 Yeah. Y- I think you could go, you could go 70/30.

Neal Brennan 12:56 I mean, you could go 80/20. I mean, you know what I mean? Depending on your definition of health.

Joe Rogan 12:58 20 is really crazy. Yeah. Fit, y- y- then you're down to, like, 5%.

Neal Brennan 13:03 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 13:03 Yeah. Which is nuts. Like, it's not that hard to work out. But the, the thing about COVID in that regard is that there, there's really no solution that made any sense. Like, when there was no vaccine and the medications were, were confusing, it was hard to know what was real and what wasn't. Hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin.

Neal Brennan 13:24 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 13:24 And, you know, what about monoclonal antibodies and all these different things?

Neal Brennan 13:27 And it was always never clear what did what.

Joe Rogan 13:30 Yeah. It's very p- very dangerous whenever you have a new disease, because you do have people trying these off-label medications, and some of them work and some of them don't. And then you have a lot of pressure from the companies that are producing vaccines, 'cause they only, they want a binary solution, 'cause that's where all the cash is. And then you have the emergency use exemption, which the only way you get that emergency use exemption is if there is no treatment that's available that's, that, that works. So if you, uh, are the person that's in charge and you stand to make untold billions of dollars from the vaccine, which they did, they suppress any information about-

Neal Brennan 14:07 I, I don't disagree with that.

Joe Rogan 14:08 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 14:08 I'm wondering i- with that playing field-

Joe Rogan 14:11 What do you do?

Neal Brennan 14:12 ... what does the king do?

Joe Rogan 14:13 You definitely don't shut the country down. You definitely don't.

Neal Brennan 14:16 The, I thought-

Joe Rogan 14:17 You give people the option.

Neal Brennan 14:17 Sometimes I think that, and then I look at 300,000 people quitting healthcare, and I'm like, "That's an unforeseen consequence." Do you know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 14:25 Yes.

Neal Brennan 14:25 Like, and that's-

Joe Rogan 14:25 Well, how about the restaurants? How about the small businesses?

Neal Brennan 14:28 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 14:28 So much of this country-

Neal Brennan 14:30 Suicide.

Joe Rogan 14:30 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 14:30 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 14:31 Oh, yeah. Drug, uh, drug abuse and drug overdoses went through the roof.

Neal Brennan 14:34 And that's from shutdown.

Joe Rogan 14:36 From shutdown. Yeah.

Neal Brennan 14:36 So, and then you go, "Well, what if we don't shut it down?"

Joe Rogan 14:39 Well, then you get Florida. Florida had deaths, but i- if you look at it, Florida, first of all, is very old. There're a lot of old people.

Neal Brennan 14:48 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 14:48 And if you adjust by age, Florida did better than a lot of other states. What, what they did was say, "We're gonna protect our elderly, protect our vulnerable, and everything stays open." And everyone's like, "You're crazy. Everyone's gonna die." And it turns out no. Turns out they were right. And the c- the economy there didn't suffer. In fact, real estate went through the roof.

Neal Brennan 15:12 R- I mean, that was everywhere.

Joe Rogan 15:13 A lot of people moved there. Yeah.

Neal Brennan 15:13 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 15:13 Well, there in particular, because a lot of people moved there. I mean, their economy did well, you know? Same thing with Texas. They, they didn't shut down. I mean, well, they shut down for a little bit, and then they were like, "You know, we're gonna open up and we're gonna be cautious, and you should be careful of your own health, and if you're a person who's vulnerable, take care of yourself. Do whatever you wanna do."

Neal Brennan 15:32 Yeah. Yeah, I guess it's just the downstream effects of that. And that's, you know ...

Joe Rogan 15:36 You just can't shut the whole country down and expect that everything's gonna be fine when you start it back up again. You, you've disastrous results. And whenever the economy crashes like, like it did with that, you have all these other unforeseen, uh, side effects of that. And, you know, a big one is people's mental health and anxiety, and, like, how's that gonna affect the rest of their life? When someone works for 20, 30 years on a business, and you have a business-

Neal Brennan 16:04 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 16:04 ... and it's up and running and it's getting by and you're, you're making a profit, and, and then all of a sudden the government comes along and says, "You have to shut this business down," and maybe you've already had COVID, and maybe you've got, maybe you were one of the lucky ones where it wasn't that big of a deal and you got over it and you're like, "Okay, I got antibodies now. I'm not worried," and now the government tells you you can't work, you cannot, it's against the law, if you do, you'll be arrested, it's madness.

Neal Brennan 16:29 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 16:29 It's unprecedented. Never happened before.

Neal Brennan 16:31 I agree. I don't think it's, well, it hasn't happened, it hasn't happened in, probably since the flu.

Joe Rogan 16:36 That was the problem. That was the, that was the problem, is, was shutting things down and telling people what they can't do. And, and, and also having this, like, blanket solution for people, whether they're 80 and fat or whether they're 20 and fit, which is nuts.

Neal Brennan 16:51 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 16:51 Like, you, you can't treat all bodies like they're exactly the same thing. That makes zero sense.

Neal Brennan 16:57 It's, I, it's, as a leader, you kinda have to, though.

Joe Rogan 17:02 Mm-hmm.

Neal Brennan 17:02 Right? You know what I mean? Y- y- you kind of ha- it does have to be one-size-fits-all somewhat.

Joe Rogan 17:07 Yeah, but you don't, uh, you don't have to impose restrictions. You can impo- you could tell people that these are the best suggestions in terms-

Neal Brennan 17:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 17:17 ... of what we should do to preserve health, but the reality of respiratory viruses is you cannot contain them. They've never been contained. No one has ever successfully contained a respiratory virus. If people are allowed to walk and they're allowed to talk and they're allowed to eat, they're gonna fucking spread it. No matter what draconian rules they put down in Australia or in China, it fucking spreads. It burns through the people, and then, I mean, and a lot of vi- virologists and people that are, um, experts in respiratory diseases were saying this at the very beginning of the pandemic. They were saying, "Listen, this, this has gotta burn through the population," and most people didn't wanna accept that. They were like, "That's, no, there's gotta be a better way." No, there's no better way. When you have a virus that spreads through people breathing on each other, it just burns through people. You know, if you have the option to be on a ranch, if you, if you got a ranch in Texas and you got all your food out there and water and, and you could just fucking stay by yourself for two years, yeah, you'll be okay.

Neal Brennan 18:22 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 18:23 And that's kinda what Howard Stern did, right? Didn't he, like, just-

Neal Brennan 18:25 I don't even know. Does anybody know?

Joe Rogan 18:26 Went to The Hamptons and just stayed put.

Neal Brennan 18:28 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 18:29 Built a studio out there, did his show from out there.

Neal Brennan 18:32 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 18:32 Never ... I mean, there was a photo of him at a restaurant, like, recently. It was, like, the first time he's out in two years.

Neal Brennan 18:38 Yeah. Yeah, I just didn't ... It was, I, I f- not like I felt bad for the... I just don't know what ... I don't know who did it well, do you know what I mean? Like, I don't know what country did it well, whenever I go Sweden, and then you ... All these things, when you do, when you start clicking links, you're like, "Ah, it seems inconclusive or contradictory or..." It always struck me as just we don't have the infrastructure for that many sick people.

Joe Rogan 19:06 Yeah. There's that. That's part of it. Um, there's also ...

Neal Brennan 19:11 And the wear and tear of like you can't make a nurse (snaps fingers) that, like, you're a nurse. You can't just certify. It's like being a pilot. Like you have-

Joe Rogan 19:20 Right.

Neal Brennan 19:20 It takes a fucking long time.

Joe Rogan 19:22 Right, right. Yeah.

Neal Brennan 19:22 And that's what they're running aga- up against now. Like, big hos- like one of 'em is like Mass General last week, like a huge hospital in Massachusetts, in Boston. Then there's people lined up in the hallway last week 'cause there's not enough nurses. There was one story, uh, in the article I read that was like they have 200 openings at a hospital and no applicants.

Joe Rogan 19:44 Oh, Jesus.

Neal Brennan 19:45 None. No applicants.

Joe Rogan 19:47 Well, imagine if you're a person who's dedicated yourself to healthcare work, and then they come along and say, "You have to get vaccinated or you're getting fired." And you'd just gone through the pandemic, you caught COVID, maybe you caught it twice.

Neal Brennan 20:00 I would also argue that there's that, and then equal parts, I would argue more like, that was a hard time to be a nurse before the vaccine.

Joe Rogan 20:09 Oh, yeah.

Neal Brennan 20:10 Spit on-

Joe Rogan 20:11 Oh, yeah.

Neal Brennan 20:11 ... screamed at-

Joe Rogan 20:12 Oh, yeah.

Neal Brennan 20:12 ... misinformation, you're working for the g- it's like-

Joe Rogan 20:15 Well, just the amount of hours they had to work, too.

Neal Brennan 20:18 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 20:18 Yeah. Look, it, but again, if you're fired because you're not willing to get vaccinated, why would you wanna come back to that job if you could do-

Neal Brennan 20:26 Right.

Joe Rogan 20:26 ... something else, if you can find another way to make a living? You'd be like, "This is a thankless, shitty place to work." And they ultimately don't give, give a fuck about you. I have a friend who's a nurse, and she was telling me how there's a weird coldness that some people in the medical profession get because they're just accustomed to people dying.

Neal Brennan 20:46 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 20:46 That it's a normal thing, and it, it becomes nor- And then there's a coldness that sort of applies to firing people, it applies to ... Like, there's not ... There's this thing where you're just accustomed to people dying.

Neal Brennan 20:59 I was talking to your guys about this before we started rolling. Like, the ... I'm of the mind, and it's wildly uninformed, but it's kind of int- whatever. Anyone who goes through heavy duty combat is never the same. I kind of am of the mind that, like, the military wrecks people.

Joe Rogan 21:19 Well, it definitely does wreck people. But some people-

Neal Brennan 21:21 I, I like the-

Joe Rogan 21:22 Some people can recover.

Neal Brennan 21:23 ... m- like, a lot of 'em.

Joe Rogan 21:23 Some people are fine afterwards. It's, everyone is psychologically wired differently. And some people can handle extreme stress. And with some people, it's just a little bit of stress and you fall apart.

Neal Brennan 21:37 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 21:37 And, uh, I don't know if it's nature or nurture, I don't know if that's genetics. I mean, I think it varies widely because I think some people are just innately good at pressure. It's really weird.

Neal Brennan 21:48 Yeah, and resilient.

Joe Rogan 21:49 Yeah. Very resilient.

Neal Brennan 21:50 What do you ... Where would you put yourself on that?

Joe Rogan 21:53 Oh, I don't know.

Neal Brennan 21:53 'Cause it, 'cause it's ... Well, not, not-

Joe Rogan 21:56 You don't know until you're at war.

Neal Brennan 21:57 Life- I would say life stresses. Do you handle stress well?

Joe Rogan 22:00 I'm pretty, pretty good at stress, yeah.

Neal Brennan 22:02 Uh, do you find when they're, when you're doing a broadcast and they go, "We're going live, three, two, one," are you like, do you tighten up even a little bit, or are you just aware?

Joe Rogan 22:13 I don't feel anything. Like, when I do the UFC-

Neal Brennan 22:15 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 22:15 ... I feel zero. It's just fine. It's like I'm here right now.

Neal Brennan 22:19 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 22:20 The only thing that, I'm excited 'cause-

Neal Brennan 22:22 Yes.

Joe Rogan 22:22 ... it's, it's cool and I wanna do a good job.

Neal Brennan 22:24 You're wearing an IFB and they go-

Joe Rogan 22:25 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 22:25 ... "Joe, we need to d- d- d- d- d- d- that," and you just-

Joe Rogan 22:27 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 22:27 ... go like, "Okay."

Joe Rogan 22:27 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 22:27 "Hey, man, so what do you ..."

Joe Rogan 22:29 Yeah. There's n- there's never a like, "Oh, shit. Oh, shit." But also, I've been doing it since 1997.

Neal Brennan 22:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 22:36 Right? So I've been d- working for the UFC since the '90s, so it's like, it's so normal to me. Now, if I just had to do it for the first time, like, uh, I was talking to a friend of mine last night, and, uh, we, uh, you know, we were talking about doing the O2 arena. You know, we did this arena in London, and he was like ... He, he came to see me there, and he was like, "What was it like, like performing in front of so many people? It must be insane." I go, "You get used to performing-"

Neal Brennan 23:01 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 23:01 "... for lots of people, and then it's normal."

Neal Brennan 23:03 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 23:03 "But if it was the first time I ever went on stage and I had to go on stage in front of all those people, I'd f- probably shit my pants."

Neal Brennan 23:09 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 23:09 "I wouldn't know what to do." It's a, 'cause it's a totally unique experience. But if it's not unique, if it's like you're n- I've done a bunch of arenas."

Neal Brennan 23:15 Yeah. Well, you just, you're ... Uh, it's like altitude training.

Joe Rogan 23:20 Yeah, like anything else. But I think it's ch- it's just reps, putting in the reps, you know. And then when you do ... Like, like when I used to fight, one of the things that I found was if I fought a lot, I wouldn't get real nervous. I would get excited, but I'd feel real confident. But if I had, like, an injury and I had to take like six months off and then I had to fight, you're like, "Woo, I haven't had that experience in a while." It's like the, the familiarity of that experience is very important. Like, you have to be on it all the time. Like, like y- filming your special, could you imagine taking six months off and then just filming a special? Like, no matter how much-

Neal Brennan 23:54 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 23:54 ... you knew the material, you'd be like, "Fuck." Even though you clearly know how to do standup. You've been doing standup a long fucking time.

Neal Brennan 24:01 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 24:01 You've been killing a long time. You know you know how to do it. It's not ... You know how to talk. It's not even a special skill like that you have to be physically prepared for. It's not like you have to be in shape to play football or something.

Neal Brennan 24:13 Right.

Joe Rogan 24:13 Anything like that.

Neal Brennan 24:14 There is a-

Joe Rogan 24:15 It's just talking.

Neal Brennan 24:15 ... weird shape, though.

Joe Rogan 24:16 There's a shape, a mental shape.

Neal Brennan 24:16 Like sh- there is a weird-

Joe Rogan 24:18 Conditioning.

Neal Brennan 24:19 ... yeah.

Joe Rogan 24:19 Like a mental conditioning.

Neal Brennan 24:20 It's like-

Joe Rogan 24:21 Yeah, yeah.

Neal Brennan 24:21 ... I'm used ... It's like I used to say it's like being a lion tamer, where like if you're not in the cage with lions every day-

Joe Rogan 24:29 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 24:30 ... after about three or four days, the lions can tell. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 24:33 (laughs) They probably can.

Neal Brennan 24:34 They c- I really believe they can.

Joe Rogan 24:36 I bet they can. I bet they can.

Neal Brennan 24:36 It's like those animal trainers, you see that lady that just goes like, "Psst."... to the peacock.

Joe Rogan 24:40 Yeah. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 24:41 It's fucking- that's how you kinda have to be with the crowd. Like, "S- sir."

Joe Rogan 24:44 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 24:44 And they can tell-

Joe Rogan 24:46 That you're comfortable.

Neal Brennan 24:47 ... in your essence.

Joe Rogan 24:48 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 24:49 Um, but, uh-

Joe Rogan 24:49 But it's also they could t- you know how to be loose and relaxed. Like, how much time did you take off during COVID? What was the most time you took off?

Neal Brennan 24:59 Uh, probably f- like, with no standup?

Joe Rogan 25:03 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 25:03 Probably four or five months.

Joe Rogan 25:04 What was it like the first time back on stage?

Neal Brennan 25:07 It was kinda gleeful. I know it- it- because it- but it was- they weren't- uh, the first good show was, like, "Okay." But the first, like, you know, like, on a, like, back room was really fun, and like-

Joe Rogan 25:21 What did you do? Like, what was it?

Neal Brennan 25:23 Uh, I was on La Cienega- I think. I don't remember the exact show, but it was on La Cienega. Mark ... I always forget his last name. Irish guy, Mark, uh, looks like Homeless D'Elia. Um, and, uh, he- it was just, like, a b- it was just s- some outdoors, like me, em, I think Jim Jefferies did it, Ian Edwards, and it was just fun. 'Cause we all talked about like, "Ah, I don't need to do it that much." And then you do it, and you're like, "This is fucking fun."

Joe Rogan 25:50 Yeah. So you did it- it was outside?

Neal Brennan 25:51 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 25:51 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 25:52 Yeah. It was outside, so it's like that's a little weird.

Joe Rogan 25:55 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 25:55 Outdoor shows are already a little weird, and then-

Joe Rogan 25:57 How much time did it take before you did an in- indoor show after that?

Neal Brennan 26:01 I don't remember.

Joe Rogan 26:03 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 26:04 What do you- (laughs) what do you- what do you- what's your arc with this?

Joe Rogan 26:07 Um, I went several months, uh, March, April, May, June, July, probably five months, four or five months, and, um, we did one weekend at the Houston Improv. But, uh, then I got really high, and I thought, "Oh my God. What if I get COVID, and give it to everybody, and a bunch of people die?" Like, "Fuck." And then so I stopped doing comedy. I was like- 'cause I was like, "Okay. I'm just gonna go to places where you can do comedy." But that was like no vaccine then, no, no real treatments. They didn't really understand what, what to do if you caught it.

Neal Brennan 26:37 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 26:37 And so it was like f- kinda touch and go. It was like, "Maybe it's wise to not do this, and wait until it actually comes." 'Cause it was only like Texas, and there was-

Neal Brennan 26:46 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 26:47 ... a few other states, Florida. There's a few places where you could go. And then I did it again in November, so it was July, and then I didn't do any standup again until like... I guess, uh, no, it was actually October. Then Dave and I started doing those shows at Stubb's.

Neal Brennan 27:01 Right.

Joe Rogan 27:02 Uh, which is an outdoor venue where we tested everyone, and we had a COVID bubble, and we had protocols in place, and that was a lot of fun. And then I did indoor shows at the Vulcan, uh, start from No- uh, actually from today, this day, two years ago.

Neal Brennan 27:18 Huh.

Joe Rogan 27:19 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 27:20 Great.

Joe Rogan 27:20 And, uh, I did this show, and I've told this story before, but Ron White was like, "Well, I think I'm gonna retire."

Neal Brennan 27:25 I've li- I heard this, this story's fucking great.

Joe Rogan 27:27 Yeah. He was gonna retire, then he got off stage, and he just grabbed me. He's like, "Whatever the fuck we have to do, we're gonna keep doing this."

Neal Brennan 27:33 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 27:34 It was amazing, just the way he was like- he was like pulsating with electricity.

Neal Brennan 27:38 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 27:38 You know? And, uh, so from then on, we've been doing shows. But the first ones back, it was weird. Like, I had to listen to recordings all day.

Neal Brennan 27:47 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 27:48 And I went over my notes, and I had to like think about transitions, and you have to like revi- I, uh... Fortunately, I was in a similar boat to you, where I was kind of ready to film a special right when everything shut down, so I had a lot of material.

Neal Brennan 28:02 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 28:02 It was pretty tight. It wasn't like it was all new stuff. Like, if I had to just do- like, if I already released a special, and then COVID came along, and then I hadn't done standup in six months, and then I'm doing like new stuff-

Neal Brennan 28:14 Uh-huh.

Joe Rogan 28:14 ... oh, I'd be fucked.

Neal Brennan 28:15 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 28:16 'Cause you don't have anything.

Neal Brennan 28:17 Did you f- have you filmed- had you- you haven't filmed in a while, right?

Joe Rogan 28:20 I filmed in August.

Neal Brennan 28:21 Is it out yet?

Joe Rogan 28:21 I just haven't done anything with it. No, I haven't even looked at it.

Neal Brennan 28:24 (laughs) Why not?

Joe Rogan 28:25 'Cause I didn't feel like it. Didn't feel like filming. It g- went great. I said, "Okay, good." Got it in the can. I think I'm gonna release it right around the time my club opens, and so my club will be open somewhere around February, March.

Neal Brennan 28:39 Okay.

Narrator 28:40 I-

Joe Rogan 28:40 So that's what I'm probably gonna do.

Neal Brennan 28:42 And, uh, do you got a plan for a streamer, or?

Joe Rogan 28:46 I haven't decided yet. You know, I'm very fortunate that I can do whatever the fuck I wanna do.

Neal Brennan 28:50 Yep.

Joe Rogan 28:50 So I'm trying to figure out what I wanna do. I might just fucking throw it on YouTube.

Neal Brennan 28:55 I hear ya.

Joe Rogan 28:56 You know?

Neal Brennan 28:56 It's- there seems to be no... Uh, you know, a friend of- a mutual friend of ours named Dave Chappelle used to say, um, "Good pussy doesn't need a pimp. Good pussy sells itself."

Joe Rogan 29:10 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 29:12 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 29:12 That's true.

Neal Brennan 29:13 Uh-

Joe Rogan 29:14 But, uh, like Ari Shaffir, he's at- I think he's close to 2.5 million now, and he's just been up for a few days.

Neal Brennan 29:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 29:22 It's way bigger than any response he would've ever gotten if it was on Netflix. It was on Netflix- his- his last special was on Netflix for the longest time, and he's like, "I don't think it ever got to a million." And-

Neal Brennan 29:32 Really?

Joe Rogan 29:33 Yeah, and i- yeah, it's hard, man. What's he at, 2.4?

Neal Brennan 29:37 Right.

Joe Rogan 29:37 2,420,000.

Neal Brennan 29:38 I haven't watched it. I was very impressed with the production design.

Joe Rogan 29:42 It's great. No, he did a great job.

Neal Brennan 29:43 Like that's like- oh, that fucking looks really cool.

Joe Rogan 29:45 Well, Ari was working on that for a long time, and then the Kobe thing happened-

Neal Brennan 29:50 I didn't know he was Jewish. I'm kidding. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 29:53 ... and he abandoned it. He was actually gonna film like very close to when that Kobe thing happened, and then, uh, he, uh, sort of put it aside, and started doing standup again, and wrote a whole new act. And then, you know, I talked to him, and I was like, "Dude, why are- you gotta put that out." Like, it was so good 'cause he had it so tight.

Neal Brennan 30:14 And it was- it's cool 'cause it's kinda evergreen, right?

Joe Rogan 30:18 Mm-hmm.

Neal Brennan 30:18 It's not- it's just I grew up orthodox-

Joe Rogan 30:20 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 30:20 ... and it was fucking weird.

Joe Rogan 30:22 Yeah, and it's, it's better now 'cause it's like- 'cause he's- like, as time goes on, you- the more you can sort of sit with a subject that's very personal to you, and then- you know, sometimes it's good to just put it aside and not even look at it for a while-

Neal Brennan 30:37 That's kinda what happened with my show.

Joe Rogan 30:39 ... and then go back to it. Mm-hmm.

Neal Brennan 30:39 I, I did it in New York for-... like four or five mon- four months every night-

Joe Rogan 30:45 So, you did it as, like, a one-man show?

Neal Brennan 30:45 ... as a off-- yeah.

Joe Rogan 30:47 Now, when you do that, do you have a guy warming up the crowd?

Neal Brennan 30:49 No.

Joe Rogan 30:49 Or do you just go out there cold?

Neal Brennan 30:51 In fact, no, I, you go out there cold, which is interesting 'cause you, your first joke's either gonna work or it isn't.

Joe Rogan 31:02 Mm. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 31:04 (laughs) So, like, you could... Sometimes, they're primed. Uh, I would say the first joke worked 80% of the time. But sometimes, you'd be like, "Okay." Like, you'd throw a punch and, like, they just stand there and you're like, "All right."

Joe Rogan 31:16 Oh. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 31:17 Uh, but, there's som- You know, Cosby doesn't have an opener.

Joe Rogan 31:20 Right.

Neal Brennan 31:21 Like, there's a way to do it where there's something about it. I don't... There's something appealing about it where, where if you don't have an opener, you just go like, "Yeah, the first two minutes will be a little bumpy, but, like, whatever."

Joe Rogan 31:34 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 31:34 It's fine.

Joe Rogan 31:34 Did you ever see, uh, Richard Pryor live? Um, the one he filmed in Long Beach?

Neal Brennan 31:39 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 31:40 Where he goes on stage and people are still sitting down?

Neal Brennan 31:43 Yes.

Joe Rogan 31:43 They're walking through the crowd sitting down and he's talking shit to them while they're walking and talking. A guy comes up and takes a photo at, like, stands by the stage and takes a photo. He's like-

Neal Brennan 31:52 It's so funny.

Joe Rogan 31:53 ... "Look at this motherfucker. What are you doing?"

Neal Brennan 31:55 It's fucking hilarious.

Joe Rogan 31:55 It's, he, I don't think he had an opener. I think he just walked out.

Neal Brennan 31:57 I didn't warm up for myself at the Netflix taping.

Joe Rogan 32:00 Oh, really?

Neal Brennan 32:01 Which was, like, uh, I would recommend.

Joe Rogan 32:04 Really? So, you did different material?

Neal Brennan 32:06 Uh-huh.

Joe Rogan 32:06 To warm up?

Neal Brennan 32:07 For eight minutes. I did, like, eight minutes-

Joe Rogan 32:09 Oh, nice.

Neal Brennan 32:10 ... and then just, like, "Hey," just touching base. And then I'm gonna come out and then it's actually better-

Joe Rogan 32:16 Oh, that's smart.

Neal Brennan 32:17 ... than having, like, "When Neil comes out-

Joe Rogan 32:19 Yeah. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 32:19 ... I need you guys to roar."

Joe Rogan 32:23 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 32:23 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 32:23 Oh, that's the worst.

Neal Brennan 32:24 Oh, it's so embarrassing.

Joe Rogan 32:25 With those fucking talk shows when they have the applause line.

Neal Brennan 32:28 Ugh.

Joe Rogan 32:28 And then there's a guy that's like, "Come on, applaud, applaud."

Neal Brennan 32:31 Yeah. I always tell 'em when I do clubs or any show when they go, like, "You guys excited to see Neil?" And then they're all like, "Yeah." And he's like, "Neil's in the back." And you're like, "Dude, you're gonna make them hate me."

Joe Rogan 32:41 Yeah. "Hate me." (laughs)

Neal Brennan 32:41 Like, I'm in the back, like, "I didn't get enough. They didn't seem excited to see me."

Joe Rogan 32:46 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 32:46 Uh, I did my own warmup. That was helpful. Second taping, I didn't have time.

Joe Rogan 32:51 Oh.

Neal Brennan 32:51 So, second taping was 20% worse than the first taping.

Joe Rogan 32:55 Really?

Neal Brennan 32:56 Yeah, I was, and it was one of these things where I'm doing the show and I'm like, "Fuck, I should've fucking..." 'Cause we were gonna lose the venue-

Joe Rogan 33:03 Shoulda warmed 'em up.

Neal Brennan 33:03 ... et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

Joe Rogan 33:04 Oh, man.

Neal Brennan 33:05 And it was like, they took, the load-in took too long. And I was like, "Ah, fuck." And then, but by the end of it, the last half was better than the first show's last half.

Joe Rogan 33:16 Oh.

Neal Brennan 33:16 Do you know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 33:16 Well, that really must've pissed you off.

Neal Brennan 33:18 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 33:18 'Cause then you're like, "Fuck, if I warmed it up."

Neal Brennan 33:19 'Cause it was like, "I could've fucking heard this, the whole fucking..." And, and that's the funny thing about doing a taping, the, it's a, I was asking about stress 'cause there was point when we, the tape day, I'm, you know, very involved in the production. Just 'cause I can direct and I can do a bunch of stuff. And I've done, like, my buddy Derek DelGaudio, who's fucking excellent and has a show called In & Of Itself on Hulu that's a magic show. I don't know if I like to call it a magic show. One of the best taped live shows you'll ever see. What? In & Of Itself on Hulu. It's fucking excellent. Um, but, um, he is directing. He's only directed his special, so he's, like, I'm, it's a lot of moving parts. Like, they didn't have a lav mic for me. They had a handheld.

Joe Rogan 34:08 Mm.

Neal Brennan 34:08 And I'm like, "I'm wearing a lav and it's 4:00."

Joe Rogan 34:11 Oh, boy.

Neal Brennan 34:11 And the audience is getting there at, we gotta tape at 5:30.

Joe Rogan 34:15 Oh, no.

Neal Brennan 34:16 And I'm like, the amount of just shit where you're like, "Oh, I'm gonna fucking kill somebody. I'm gonna fucking kill somebody, I swear to God."

Joe Rogan 34:25 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 34:25 I had a funny, uh, observation, which is, uh, when you're, you know, when everybody gets the credit at the end, roll credits. If you get to give them all a grade, like sound, B-minus.

Joe Rogan 34:38 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 34:38 Didn't love the lav move. Didn't love the, the-

Joe Rogan 34:40 Did it, was it just poor communication or did you just have a shitty sound guy?

Neal Brennan 34:43 Uh, yeah, it's just one of those things where, like, there's a lot of cracks. Just shit can fall through... You know being in charge of a thing and doing arena shows and doing all that. People fuck up.

Joe Rogan 34:57 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 34:58 Just by nature. Like, you know. I remember Schumer thought it was sexism, Rock thought it was racism. When they started directing stuff and people were fucking up, they thought, "This is about my identity. This is, they don't respect me, da-da-da-da." I kind of am paranoid enough to be like, "They're fucking haters and do-do-do." Like, you can, I can easily lapse into that. And it's just people, human error.

Joe Rogan 35:28 Incompetence. There's a lot of that.

Neal Brennan 35:31 30%, I, I have a theory, 30% of things just get fucked up.

Joe Rogan 35:38 30?

Neal Brennan 35:38 30. If I say, "Hey, I need X," 30% of the time people don't hear you, they misinterpret, they go, "I have a better idea."

Joe Rogan 35:49 But, like, straightforward stuff, like if you're doing a theater-

Neal Brennan 35:53 Uh-huh.

Joe Rogan 35:53 ... and there's a sound guy who works for the theater, it's almost 100% works. Almost 100% of the time, that guy knows what he's doing. You get in there-

Neal Brennan 36:02 Yep.

Joe Rogan 36:02 No? You've had problems?

Neal Brennan 36:03 I, Atlanta.

Joe Rogan 36:05 What happened in Atlanta?

Neal Brennan 36:06 In Atlanta, the guy, uh, I said, "Play Kendrick Lamar." My, the joke I always say is, "What should we play for your entrance?" I'd say, "Anything but Eminem."

Joe Rogan 36:15 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 36:16 Anything, because they go like, "Oh, he's a white guy. He's affiliated with white people. We're gonna play Eminem." And I'm like, "Nope, nope, don't, please." Uh, and so I'm like, "Play Kendrick Lamar, give him the song, give him the time." 10 seconds in, and, uh, it l- the Atlanta show for one, I came out to nothing. And then I go, "What?" And they go, "Oh, yeah, he's a fill-in guy." Montreal, bunch of shows, there was a fuck-up every show. Lighting cues, just...I, and I don't even ... You get mad. It, it, the taping of my first Netflix special, 3 Mics, the, uh, the last 20 minutes of the second taping, there was a nightclub next door, Joe.

Joe Rogan 37:01 Oh, no.

Neal Brennan 37:02 Here comes the thumping.

Joe Rogan 37:04 Oh, no.

Neal Brennan 37:05 Thump, thump, thump, thump, thump.

Joe Rogan 37:07 And you can hear it.

Neal Brennan 37:07 So my dad's dying. I'm literally telling a monologue about my dad dying. Umm, umm, umm, umm. And the audience ... And I literally had the thought, "You, you literally cannot even think about it. You cannot, even a little bit, get testy. It's not gonna help."

Joe Rogan 37:29 And you can't address it?

Neal Brennan 37:30 Nope, 'cause I'm, like, doing a show.

Joe Rogan 37:33 How loud is it? Does it pick up in the sound?

Neal Brennan 37:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 37:36 Oh, no.

Neal Brennan 37:38 The good news is, if you're, if I'm talking and there's a thump underneath me, you're not gonna hear it, meaning, like-

Joe Rogan 37:45 Right.

Neal Brennan 37:45 But when I pause. So, we had to go through the sound and take out every thump.

Joe Rogan 37:51 (exhales)

Neal Brennan 37:52 (laughs) Kind of by hand. But how-

Joe Rogan 37:54 For how many minutes left in your set?

Neal Brennan 37:56 In the set? 15.

Joe Rogan 37:59 Oh, God.

Neal Brennan 37:59 And, dude, it's a monologue about my dad dying, so there's zero laughs.

Joe Rogan 38:05 (exhales) (laughs)

Neal Brennan 38:07 (laughs) And that's the kind of thing where it's like, where you go, "Yeah, it wa-" No. I don't ... Again, maybe it's just my luck. Maybe it's just, like, I just have bad luck with shit like that. But, you know, at a cert- uh, like, you ... It just, shit fucks up, be it the sound or the eh, the music or the lighting cue or the, a woman, the- You know, they just, you- I- It's like, I do the ... And you can rehearse it. I rehearsed it five times. Nope.

Joe Rogan 38:33 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 38:34 Nope.

Joe Rogan 38:34 So, your thing that you did, the way you did it with this one-man show, what was the motivation behind this? Like, why did you decide to do a special that's not nece- It's stand-up, but it's not necessarily really stand-up. You have, like, you have a presentation.

Neal Brennan 38:49 Yeah. The, the, this one has a, this one's called Blocks, the new one on Netflix. Well, I'll tell you, the, the 3 Mics one, I did the Comedy Central special 10 years ago. I thought it was good. You know, it was good jokes, whatever, da, da, da, da, dah. People didn't really ... Eh. Like, y- like, cult-

Joe Rogan 39:08 10 years ago, though, Comedy Central was already in this weird spot where people weren't listening as much.

Neal Brennan 39:13 Yeah. I agree with that.

Joe Rogan 39:14 You know?

Neal Brennan 39:14 The ratings were surprisingly good. It was just one of these things like, I didn't become a big club act. I didn't ... It was just I didn't have, like, I n- I'm now a devotee. It was kind of like, "Oh, that guy's kinda funny."

Joe Rogan 39:28 Yeah, but I think everybody got that from Comedy Central specials. Like, you had to be like Kevin Hart. Like, there's only a few guys who did Netflix, or excuse me, Comedy Central specials and just took off after 2000, you know? It was like, later, like when you get to 2012, 2014, now you're dealing with streaming services. You're dealing with other things, and you just don't have as many people watching. And it, it's also you got commercials, which is the death of comedy.

Neal Brennan 39:57 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 39:57 You're doing these seven-minute chunks, and they split-

Neal Brennan 39:59 Netflix has commercials now, Joe.

Joe Rogan 40:00 Isn't that wild?

Neal Brennan 40:01 Yeah. I know. I want to, I'm like, I wanna watch it. I w- I wonder, 'cause it's not, they don't even say, "Where do you want us to put the commercial?"

Joe Rogan 40:09 But are the commercials before shows or during shows?

Neal Brennan 40:12 I don't, I have no i- It's new, so I have no ...

Joe Rogan 40:14 Before?

Neal Brennan 40:14 I think it's during.

Joe Rogan 40:16 Oh.

Neal Brennan 40:16 'Cause if they're after, ain't nobody watching it.

Joe Rogan 40:18 If they do it during shows, I will be very upset.

Neal Brennan 40:22 I've heard that Shonda Rhimes and some of the people that have shows on there are, like, a little bit pissed about that they ... It's like part of the reason they went to Netflix is 'cause they wanted the just shit to play the way they want it to play.

Joe Rogan 40:36 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 40:36 Which I get.

Joe Rogan 40:36 But what is their ... They, uh, they, they lost a shitload of stock with the, the Chappelle thing. Like, their s- their stock crashed-

Neal Brennan 40:44 It didn't have to do with Dave though.

Joe Rogan 40:45 ... with their response to that. Well, it did have. It had to do with that, because it had to do with-

Neal Brennan 40:48 It was a, it was an earnings c- It was a, to me, my understanding of it was the earnings. They just had, they, it was the first time they ... subscribers were flat. Or they, I think they lost a million at one point.

Joe Rogan 40:58 Right. But it was also, there was a very big public response to the woke bullshit that they were pushing and the fact that they would entertain, that that special was in any way transphobic to the point where they had to, uh, well, uh, they had to apologize to people for this, what was essentially like a love letter to a dead friend of his. And to pretend that it was transphobic was fucking nonsense, and a lot of people were upset about it. I think it had ... And then Elon Musk talked about how-

Neal Brennan 41:29 It was also the-

Joe Rogan 41:29 ... so much of it was unwatchable-

Neal Brennan 41:31 It was the number on-

Joe Rogan 41:32 ... because the-

Neal Brennan 41:32 It was the number one-

Joe Rogan 41:32 Elon Musk talked about how it was unwatchable, the woke bullshit that's on there. There was a narrative, and that was exactly the time where it crashed, exactly the time where the stock crashed. There wa- there was ... Unquestionably, there's a narrative that Netflix was fucking up, and then there was Cuties, that fucked up show that they did about, uh, little-

Neal Brennan 41:53 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 41:53 ... kids twerking and shit.

Neal Brennan 41:55 That's one of my favorite, one of my favorite shows.

Joe Rogan 41:56 Ah, it is?

Neal Brennan 41:56 I loved ... Boy, oh, boy. Is that still on? I, I must have watched it.

Joe Rogan 41:58 Do they, can you still watch that? Or do they, they take it down?

Neal Brennan 42:01 Joe, I would binge that, and then I'd binge it again.

Joe Rogan 42:04 I bet you did.

Neal Brennan 42:05 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 42:05 You don't have kids.

Neal Brennan 42:06 My God.

Joe Rogan 42:07 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 42:08 Uh, uh, yeah, no, I don't, I ... My understanding was that they're, they were, uh, not related-

Joe Rogan 42:16 It's still available.

Neal Brennan 42:17 ... uh, timeline-wise.

Joe Rogan 42:18 Wow.

Neal Brennan 42:19 Um.

Joe Rogan 42:19 It's still available.

Neal Brennan 42:20 Fahim has a really funny joke about, about, uh, Euphoria, the HBO show.

Joe Rogan 42:26 That's the one about kids?

Neal Brennan 42:28 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 42:28 High school kids?

Neal Brennan 42:28 And he's like, "Who is this for?"

Joe Rogan 42:30 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 42:30 'Cause if you're an adult, you're just watching teenagers fuck each other nude?

Joe Rogan 42:36 Right, right.

Neal Brennan 42:37 And if you're a teenager, you're just watching kids do dru- Like, it's just, it's like no one has, no one watches it with the right, for the right reason.

Joe Rogan 42:45 Right. (laughs) That's a good point.

Neal Brennan 42:47 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 42:47 That's a good point. Um.

Neal Brennan 42:49 S-

Joe Rogan 42:49 Do you remember Kids?

Neal Brennan 42:51 ... dude.

Joe Rogan 42:51 Remember the movie, Kids?

Neal Brennan 42:52 Kids is one of my favorite movies. I, I, that, there are some movies that are like ful- eh, that movie's like, got very little plot, but you were never, you ne-... I was 19 and like lived in the city.

Joe Rogan 43:09 Mm.

Neal Brennan 43:10 And would just walk around. I didn't skate, but like I was like a, a r- just a little rat who lived on St. Marks.

Joe Rogan 43:17 Mm.

Neal Brennan 43:18 So that movie-

Joe Rogan 43:19 Spoke to you.

Neal Brennan 43:20 Yeah. I mean, I just think it's a really well-made movie.

Joe Rogan 43:23 That life is super dangerous now with fentanyl.

Neal Brennan 43:26 Uh-huh.

Joe Rogan 43:26 Like it, it was, it was dangerous back then to just be running around, being a teenager, doing drugs, but that life now is fucking horrendously dangerous.

Neal Brennan 43:36 Yeah. Yeah, that's the, the, you know when they, somebody dies, you just go, "Ah, it's fentanyl."

Joe Rogan 43:42 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 43:43 Like now, it's, if it's not, if it's Prince or I'm sure the Aaron Carter kid who died recently-

Joe Rogan 43:49 Yeah, how did he die?

Neal Brennan 43:50 ... it'll be, it'll be... If it's not directly fentanyl, it'll be i- drug use, long-term, heart's-

Joe Rogan 43:56 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 43:56 ... you know.

Joe Rogan 43:57 He was trying to come on.

Neal Brennan 43:58 Was he?

Joe Rogan 43:59 Yeah. I did- I w- didn't think I would have a good conversation with him. He was just so... Uh, uh, I've had conversations with multiple child stars. It's a sad reality that they don't develop. There, there is no redoing that. If you become famous when you are a young kid, you're fucked.

Neal Brennan 44:18 You're absolutely fucked.

Joe Rogan 44:19 Almost always. Like, maybe Jodie Foster. I've never talked to her, but she seems pretty balanced. She's fine.

Neal Brennan 44:25 You have to, you, I think you have to decide, "I'm gonna stop. I'm have to take a break, and I have to go..." Jodie Foster went to Yale, I think. The girl from, uh, Harry Potter went to school. If you make it concerted effort-

Joe Rogan 44:44 To do something else.

Neal Brennan 44:44 ... to do something else, and you ha- and this is a big one, you have to hope your parents didn't fuck you. Monetarily.

Joe Rogan 44:51 Yeah. Hoo, I have a friend-

Neal Brennan 44:53 Which-

Joe Rogan 44:53 ... who was a child star who s- he found out late in life that his parents stole like $6 million from him.

Neal Brennan 44:58 Yeah. And you just-

Joe Rogan 44:59 It's real common. They feel like they deserve it.

Neal Brennan 45:01 Yeah. I think there's a new law that protects kids.

Joe Rogan 45:04 Mm.

Neal Brennan 45:05 But that's one of those things, you just gotta fucking hope, dude. You gotta hope, uh, eh, which you're...

Joe Rogan 45:13 (snoring)

Neal Brennan 45:13 You don't... You handle your... You seem to have a l- not a lot of, uh, outside people, or you hide it well. Meaning you don't seem like you don't have a crazy family, you don't have a crazy, like, there's not a lot of people asking you for handouts that I'm aware of, obviously. I'm sure you get plenty of like, "Hey, do you think I could..." But, but it seems like-

Joe Rogan 45:37 It's mostly people I don't know well-

Neal Brennan 45:39 Right.

Joe Rogan 45:39 ... honestly-

Neal Brennan 45:40 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 45:40 ... that are asking me for stuff.

Neal Brennan 45:41 Well, that's when it becomes family or you gotta hope that you, you, uh, you know, that you just are in a good situation. Like I w- I did a thing with that guy Giannis Antetokounmpo, the basketball player. And he's Greek and, like, him and his brothers are all in the NBA. Or like, i- they all are pro basketball players and it's like... And I was talking about it, I was like, "You're very lucky that you're all paid."

Joe Rogan 46:12 Mm.

Neal Brennan 46:12 You're all... Like, he doesn't have to worry about, um, you know, his bro... And it's like i- he doesn't have to worry about people... That's a real drag, that family stuff, 'cause it's a-

Joe Rogan 46:25 It's a real drag, yeah.

Neal Brennan 46:26 ... 'cause it's, it can... You feel bad. You feel bad if you don't give it to them and you feel bad if you do give it to them.

Joe Rogan 46:33 Well, here's what happens. You never are even anymore. You're never just two people talking.

Neal Brennan 46:39 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 46:39 There's always someone who wants something from you.

Neal Brennan 46:42 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 46:42 And they're angling towards that, and maybe they're not doing it today, but maybe they were doing it and setting you up for something they wanna do in the future, and you sense it, and you recognize that the conversation is very slanted.

Neal Brennan 46:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 46:55 It's not a normal conversation. And that becomes really sad for people. And some people-

Neal Brennan 46:59 Yeah, it makes you not trust anyone.

Joe Rogan 47:01 Yeah. Some people feed off of it though. Some people like it when everybody is like looking for something from them and they, they can complain about it.

Neal Brennan 47:08 Uh-huh.

Joe Rogan 47:08 And they can... You know, they li- they like it also because it puts them in a position where like they're the, the fucking belle of the ball.

Neal Brennan 47:14 Paterfamilias, yeah.

Joe Rogan 47:16 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 47:16 It's the, yeah, you get to be like the, "Come sit down. What do you need?"

Joe Rogan 47:19 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 47:20 Which I don't, I wouldn't, that doesn't appeal to me.

Joe Rogan 47:24 D-

Neal Brennan 47:24 And that, that interaction, uh, that status thing, that like, "I need something from you."

Joe Rogan 47:31 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 47:31 And it just makes it not very human.

Joe Rogan 47:37 It's not very human. And y- you're never gonna have like real conversations with those people, 'cause they're not, if you, they think you're being a cunt, they're never gonna tell you if they want something from you.

Neal Brennan 47:44 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 47:45 So like, y- you know, if you're one of those guys that has like a, a, a bunch of sycophants that travel with you everywhere you go and they're always kissing your ass, like you can get real delusional really quickly.

Neal Brennan 47:57 Yeah. And weirdly bitter even though you invite them.

Joe Rogan 48:03 Yeah. Yeah. I was just talking to a friend who's a, a very successful touring comedian, and he was explaining to me how he's having problems with his opening acts being entitled and asking for things and getting things and doing things, and he was really upset about it. And we were having this conversation, I go, "Dude, this is really bumming me out, 'cause you're killing it at life right now."

Neal Brennan 48:25 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 48:25 "Like, you should be enjoying the shit out of it. And instead you're focusing on these few people that are trying to take advantage of you." And it was like legitimate taking advantage of him.

Neal Brennan 48:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 48:36 Like, there was some of them where I was like, "What?" Just people like literally like showing up to fly with him and just uh, had to-

Neal Brennan 48:44 I think I had the same conversation with the same person.

Joe Rogan 48:46 ... put hotel rooms on his credit card. He's like-

Neal Brennan 48:49 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 48:49 ... "What the fuck?"

Neal Brennan 48:50 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 48:51 Uh-

Neal Brennan 48:51 And they're mad...They're mad at him.

Joe Rogan 48:54 They're mad at him.

Neal Brennan 48:54 That's the crazy part, is like, you ... It's the, I think Chris Rock did a joke about it, where it's like, you, you give them money and then they're mad. And it's like, wait, what are you- 'Cause they, because you represent their failure, their inadequacies.

Joe Rogan 49:14 Because you're so successful.

Neal Brennan 49:15 Because you're so successful.

Joe Rogan 49:18 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 49:18 And they hate the fact that they have to ask you for anything. It just fucks up the balance of, it fucks up the balance of humanity. It just fucks up like the, the, uh, which is I think also why shows like this work, 'cause y- you can only pretend for, you know what I mean? Like-

Joe Rogan 49:42 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 49:42 ... it's just like, you just, you get a sense of what the person's like.

Joe Rogan 49:45 Yeah, after a while. You, I mean, I guess ... That's why a lot of these celebrities that start these things, they can't keep up. They bail. You know, like the Meghan Markle's and the fucking-

Neal Brennan 49:56 Right.

Joe Rogan 49:56 ... I guess she's doing it now, but Prince Harry was doing one for a while, and Bruce Springsteen and Obama were doing one for a while. Just like-

Neal Brennan 50:02 Yeah, that was wild.

Joe Rogan 50:03 ... terrible. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 50:04 Like guys, you don't gotta do this. Plea- I'm begging you to stop. Is there a, is there a Patreon that makes you stop?

Joe Rogan 50:11 You just ca- (laughs) You just can't keep faking it. It's too hard to, "If you have an image that you like to do-"

Neal Brennan 50:19 Yup. Bruce.

Joe Rogan 50:19 "... there's a way you like to talk." Like-

Neal Brennan 50:22 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 50:22 You know, I'd like to get that guy alone. I would love to talk to Obama alone, where he wasn't worried, you know? If I was like, "Dude, I, I promise you I will tell no one we're having this conversation."

Neal Brennan 50:32 I've heard quotes from Obama off the record that are all very funny and very interesting.

Joe Rogan 50:39 I'm sure. The fucking guy was the President of the United States-

Neal Brennan 50:43 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 50:43 ... for eight years.

Neal Brennan 50:44 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 50:44 And he's got a very unique background. He's very, he's a very smart guy.

Neal Brennan 50:47 And a fucking world-class brain.

Joe Rogan 50:49 World-class brain, best statesman we've ever had-

Neal Brennan 50:53 Yes.

Joe Rogan 50:53 ... as President. The most, the best representation of what you would want, if you want the rest of the world to see what is like an, an ex- excellent American like.

Neal Brennan 51:02 Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 51:04 But can't be himself. But meanwhile has all the money in the world and can't be himself. Like w- how wild is that?

Neal Brennan 51:10 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 51:10 Like, you can't just fuck around, you know? I mean, if Obama just fucked around. If like Obama did a podcast and he had sunglasses on like Tim Dillon-

Neal Brennan 51:19 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 51:19 ... and he's just like sitting back and he sparked up a joint going-

Neal Brennan 51:21 "South."

Joe Rogan 51:21 "... Let me tell you-"

Neal Brennan 51:23 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 51:23 "... what I think about this electoral college bullshit."

Neal Brennan 51:25 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 51:26 You know?

Neal Brennan 51:26 So, poop.

Joe Rogan 51:26 Be amazing.

Neal Brennan 51:27 Yeah. But you also know, I mean, that it's, there's things, not like, I don't think there's a lot of things you wanna do that you can't do. But, there's like, uh, you know, there's, I, it's almost like Obama is everyone's parent.

Joe Rogan 51:41 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 51:42 Like he can't be-

Joe Rogan 51:43 Can't smoke crack.

Neal Brennan 51:43 It's like shit you wouldn't do around ... "You got daughters."

Joe Rogan 51:46 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 51:47 Yah!

Joe Rogan 51:47 Yeah, you can't do that.

Neal Brennan 51:49 Yeah, like, "Ah, no."

Joe Rogan 51:50 Yeah, I think that's the case. Well, that's the beauty about being a comic, right? Like you're kind of expected to be at least slightly fucked up. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 51:59 Yeah. Yeah. Well now.

Joe Rogan 52:01 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 52:02 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 52:02 I mean it's like, you can s- kinda talk about whatever you want and that's part of your business model. If you're a, a person who is the former President of the United States and you wanna talk about getting your balls cradled-

Neal Brennan 52:15 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 52:15 ... going, "I just like the gentle cradling of the balls."

Neal Brennan 52:18 Yup.

Joe Rogan 52:18 "Just a gentle tickling."

Neal Brennan 52:19 Yup.

Joe Rogan 52:20 You know?

Neal Brennan 52:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 52:20 No, no, no, no, no.

Neal Brennan 52:21 No, you can't-

Joe Rogan 52:22 You can't tell people that.

Neal Brennan 52:22 ... you literally can't.

Joe Rogan 52:23 Who doesn't like their balls cradled? Like tell ... What are we doing here?

Neal Brennan 52:27 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 52:27 Are we pretending that getting your balls cradled-

Neal Brennan 52:30 Yeah, you don't, like, yeah.

Joe Rogan 52:30 ... is not great?

Neal Brennan 52:31 Yeah. Uh- (laughs)

Joe Rogan 52:33 (laughs) Why does he have to pretend?

Neal Brennan 52:34 It's his whole act. He does like 20 minutes of getting his balls cradled.

Joe Rogan 52:37 (laughs) He just walks out there.

Neal Brennan 52:37 It's so weird, it's his closer.

Joe Rogan 52:38 He's in this beautiful suit. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 52:40 Yeah. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 52:41 "Let me sit down."

Neal Brennan 52:41 Yup.

Joe Rogan 52:42 "Tell you how I like my balls treated."

Neal Brennan 52:43 Yup. Can you bel- Uh, well, the, the question I wanted to ask you about all this stuff is, is how do you deal with the pre- when people ask me about you, people ask me about Dave, they ask me, uh, the, like, you guys are like fire brands. Uh, I always say that it just looks too stressful for me. Like y- the amount of times ... You maybe are even unaware of it, but like the vaccine stuff and you make a video and you, is that, are those days hellish, stressful? Are you just like, "All right, I'll make a video. Oh, they didn't, I fucked up the thing with their, I didn't fuck up, or do you want me to say I fucked up?" Or like, what's it like in your body?

Joe Rogan 53:34 Uh, it depends on the day. It depends on what the controversy is. But generally I don't read anything about me. I don't, e- even now, like if, like if I see some article with some bullshit headline, you know, I don't read it. I'm not reading things about ... I'm not interested in people's opinions of me.

Neal Brennan 53:53 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 53:53 It's like you can't take in all that. That is not good for you. And that's a, like a learning process. Took a while to figure that out. And if you stay offline and just communicate with people that you know and you meet in normal real life, the world's fine.

Neal Brennan 54:10 Oh, yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:10 The world's normal.

Neal Brennan 54:11 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:11 The problem that happens with people when they get locked up in a controversy is that they start dwelling on all these different opinions on them. And they start taking it in and considering it and wanting to argue it. "But I never said it that way."

Neal Brennan 54:27 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 54:27 "That's not what I meant."

Neal Brennan 54:27 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:28 "You talked about it in context."

Neal Brennan 54:28 These motherfuckers and then it becomes this emotional thing.

Joe Rogan 54:31 You fucking prick. Did you see what they wrote?

Neal Brennan 54:32 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:32 Like there, that doesn't do you any good. That is not a positive. There's no, there's no benefit to that. Zero. There's zero benefit. So don't do it. And I always tell comedians, I'm like, "Those good comments that you read? Those aren't good for you either."

Neal Brennan 54:45 I don't, dude, I, the reason I wanted to talk to you about it is 'cause, uh, yesterday the special comes out and it's a fucking big day. And it's a lot of attention.And it's a lot of... And I had taken Instagram off my phone because I was in-

Joe Rogan 55:02 You wanna stay healthy?

Neal Brennan 55:04 Yeah. I mean, I'd, I'd been... I was in Mia- or no, I was in, uh, Hawaii, and I'd posted a video, and then I was just, like, on, in paradise, worrying about the comments.

Joe Rogan 55:17 Ugh.

Neal Brennan 55:17 And I was like, "This is a fucking waste of y- of y- of your life, dude."

Joe Rogan 55:22 Yeah. It literally is.

Neal Brennan 55:23 Like, you have to not do this.

Joe Rogan 55:24 Yeah, yeah.

Neal Brennan 55:25 And I took it off my phone, and it was... And it's been great, and then I put it back on yesterday because I had to post something. That's what I tell myself. But also, I wanted some of the juice, Joe.

Joe Rogan 55:38 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 55:39 I wanted some of the fucking juice.

Joe Rogan 55:41 Give me some love, people.

Neal Brennan 55:42 Give me a little bit of the juice.

Joe Rogan 55:44 Tell me you're loving it.

Neal Brennan 55:44 And I got a lot of juice.

Joe Rogan 55:46 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 55:47 And, and, uh, the... And it was like, I liked it. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 55:55 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 55:57 I l- The juice was delicious, Joe, and I was like-

Joe Rogan 56:02 Well, you did a good job. I'm-

Neal Brennan 56:02 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 56:03 Look, I haven't seen your new special, but you're a fucking hilarious comic, so I'm sure you killed it.

Neal Brennan 56:07 Yeah, thank you.

Joe Rogan 56:07 Which is great.

Neal Brennan 56:08 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 56:08 So you getting good juice.

Neal Brennan 56:09 Right.

Joe Rogan 56:09 You deserve that juice.

Neal Brennan 56:10 Yes. But, and I was like... And I, and I liked it, and I was telling somebody last night, I was like, I was like, uh, you know, "I really liked it," and then I was like, "But this isn't... That's not me." And I'm like, "Oh, it is v- Yeah, it is. It is me." I like the juice.

Joe Rogan 56:27 Mm-hmm.

Neal Brennan 56:27 How do I... You know, I've, I obviously, like, took it off my phone again, whatever, whatever.

Joe Rogan 56:36 Obviously. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 56:36 Of course. Obviously. It goes without saying. Took it off my phone again. What...? But, and then I think about the, the... I, I, I could feel the, like, uh, like patc- like being a cunt coming up in me. Just being a c- like, just being like, "Well, yeah, I deserve, and da-da-da-da," and I'm going, "Yeah." Just, like, and I'm, and I'm, I'm, uh, like a sore winner, where I'm like, "You motherfuckers." Like, I'm telling people off in my head, and just, like, bat- Mike Nichols, the director who was a comic, and he was in a- he was Nichols & May, he said being a performer, he'd, like, transitioned to being just a director, and he said being a performer brought out the baby in him.

Joe Rogan 57:18 Ooh.

Neal Brennan 57:18 Where he'd say he would be, like, he'd notice who had the bigger dressing room.

Joe Rogan 57:24 Oh, no.

Neal Brennan 57:25 And just shit like that. And I... Obviously, it was 12 hours of being... I called myself a despot in exile, where I was... (laughs) I'm, like, in exile, and then I get, like, the country welcoming me back, and I'm like, "There's gonna be some changes around here." In 12 hours, I became a fucking monster, and I thought about you, and I thought about Dave, and I thought about guys who... Chris L., just people that are... It's... Adam Sander. Like, big attention poi- a lot of positive attention pointed at you, and you must, at a certain point, go, "I have to make a very firm decision about this."

Joe Rogan 58:06 Yeah. Well, Dave doesn't have social media on his phone at all.

Neal Brennan 58:08 I, but I, but at the same time-

Joe Rogan 58:10 I think that's very smart.

Neal Brennan 58:11 ... he gets sent every- he sees everything.

Joe Rogan 58:13 He gets sent important things.

Neal Brennan 58:16 'Cause people send him shit.

Joe Rogan 58:16 With things that people think are important.

Neal Brennan 58:18 Okay.

Joe Rogan 58:18 I tell people never send me anything about me.

Neal Brennan 58:20 Well, that's... Somebody sent me a review, and I... My public... I was like, "Don't send me this."

Joe Rogan 58:24 Don't read it. Don't read it.

Neal Brennan 58:24 Literally, don't send me it. I don't wanna read it. Uh...

Joe Rogan 58:26 People are entitled to their opinion, and they should express their opinion. There's nothing wrong with that.

Neal Brennan 58:31 I agree with that. I'd say that, yeah.

Joe Rogan 58:32 But the idea that you should participate in their opinion when you don't even know these people, and you should take this in, and then some people treat it like gospel. Like, some people's p- confidence has been destroyed by someone telling them they suck.

Neal Brennan 58:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 58:45 I mean, it really can fuck with some people's heads.

Neal Brennan 58:47 It was fucking up my Miami- my Hawaii trip.

Joe Rogan 58:50 Well, one of the things that I do that I think is very important is I work out really hard, and I think that resets my day every time. So all the other things, like, "Oh, I should read the comments," like, "Wha- what are they saying?" Th- none of that happened. I j- there's no room for that. I'm so exhausted from that, like, physically exhausted.

Neal Brennan 59:10 You almost kill yourself. It's a weird, like, near-death experience.

Joe Rogan 59:14 (laughs) So I get to a point where I've wrung all the stress out of my body.

Neal Brennan 59:19 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 59:20 And when I do that, then other stuff doesn't seem like it's a big deal. It really isn't-

Neal Brennan 59:26 Well, it's... You, you-

Joe Rogan 59:27 ... 'cause it's like the physical discomfort-

Neal Brennan 59:29 Yeah, you reset your hierarchy of needs.

Joe Rogan 59:31 Yes.

Neal Brennan 59:32 You... It's, uh, it's... Yeah, it's like, uh, I did a... I wrote a joke with Blake Griffin, the basketball player one time, where I was like, they're asking guys... They're interviewing guys after they've just ex- they're trying not to... They're getting... They're trying to get oxygen to their brain.

Joe Rogan 59:49 Right.

Neal Brennan 59:49 Like, it's a bad time to do an interview.

Joe Rogan 59:53 Well, I was doing interviews with people after they got knocked unconscious, and I-

Neal Brennan 59:57 And do you feel... Are you kinda like, "Agh, I do not like it"?

Joe Rogan 1:00:02 It's not a good time to interview people. They make mistakes, 'cause like you just had your brain shut off. Like, some- maybe they think they wanna fight, or maybe they think something... They don't know what the fuck just happened.

Neal Brennan 1:00:12 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:12 And it... There's varying degrees of that. Like, you can pretend, "Oh, he knows. He's playing dumb." But you have zero idea what's going on in a person's brain unless you are them and you have been knocked out.

Neal Brennan 1:00:23 Do they have a policy of n- like, not doing that anymore, or are you still doing it?

Joe Rogan 1:00:26 Well, I said I won't do it, and then I fucked up and did it with, uh, Daniel Cormier. But I was so confused in that fight, because, um, Daniel's a good friend. I love him to death. And Jon Jones had just knocked him out, and I was in this state-

Neal Brennan 1:00:43 D- this is not... Is this recent or no?

Joe Rogan 1:00:44 No, this was a few years back.

Neal Brennan 1:00:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:46 I haven't done any, like, knockouts s- interviews since, but I think I did a couple of TKOs, and I think it's a judgment call. Like, there's sometimes when the guy's getting fucked up, but it's really like he's just beaten, he's getting his legs kicked and punched, and the referee comes and stops the fight, but he's okay. Like, he's n- he just got fucked up. He's not out cold. But sometimes guys get knocked out cold, and when they get knocked out cold, like, ooh, you're, you, you don't really know, 'cause they went away-

Neal Brennan 1:01:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:01:18 ... and then they come back.

Neal Brennan 1:01:19 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:01:19 And it's f-

Neal Brennan 1:01:20 They're in an arena, for some reason.

Joe Rogan 1:01:21 Some guys are fine.

Neal Brennan 1:01:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:01:21 Some guys are fine, and they handle it with grace and dignity. And, you know, they're amazing at it. And that's also depending upon that knockout versus a different knockout. Like, what happened to you that day? Like, how bad did you get beat up before you got knocked out? Was it just one punch? Was it a kick to the head? Is a kick to the head worse than a punch to the head? Even though both knock you out, the force of a kick is way higher. So, you don't really know. You don't really know until you're talking to them and they... I don't think you really will ever know, 'cause a lot of people can talk on autopilot and then they'll tell you-

Neal Brennan 1:01:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:01:55 ... like, they go back to-

Neal Brennan 1:01:56 I don't remember talking to you.

Joe Rogan 1:01:57 Yeah, they go back to the dressing room. They have no idea they fought, and then they're in the hospital room afterwards, they don't know what happened, and they lose, like, hours of the night. It's really common.

Neal Brennan 1:02:07 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:02:08 So, but to ask them to do-

Neal Brennan 1:02:09 But I think you're smart, to get back to the original thing, you're smart to reset your hierarchy.

Joe Rogan 1:02:18 Yes.

Neal Brennan 1:02:18 Where you're fucking exhausted and you wanna just breathe and get your body back to, like, a reg- but, and you still have all that, like, exercise drain/tingle.

Joe Rogan 1:02:28 There's, there's that too. There's like, you, you exhaust yourself, which I think is very good for you.

Neal Brennan 1:02:32 My brother Kevin used to-

Joe Rogan 1:02:34 Because it relieves you of the stress.

Neal Brennan 1:02:35 ... used to jog every day to run the Brennan out of him. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:02:41 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:02:42 Like, we got bad shit in us.

Joe Rogan 1:02:44 That's hilarious.

Neal Brennan 1:02:44 I have to run it out of me.

Joe Rogan 1:02:46 That's hilarious.

Neal Brennan 1:02:47 It's fucking very funny. And, hey, and, but, that, that's a smart approach.

Joe Rogan 1:02:54 There's, so there's two things going on. There's the physical thing where you're wringing out the stress, which I think is very real. It makes you feel better and it's easier to get by. But then there's also the psychological thing, because to work out really hard is very difficult to do, and you think things are difficult until you compare them to things that are very difficult.

Neal Brennan 1:03:13 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:03:14 Like, very difficult things, like if you have... If, say if you're going on a hike in the mountains and you're gonna backpack in and camp out, and it's 14 miles in.

Neal Brennan 1:03:26 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:03:26 You have a 70-pound backpack, 'cause you have all your food, you have your bedding, you have a tent, you have all this shit on your back, you and your friends, and you're walking 13, 14 miles in.

Neal Brennan 1:03:38 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:03:39 That's fucking hard.

Neal Brennan 1:03:41 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:03:41 When you're 9,000 feet above sea level, you're like (breathes heavily) .

Neal Brennan 1:03:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:03:46 That's real hard.

Neal Brennan 1:03:47 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:03:47 It's not comments on fucking Twitter.

Neal Brennan 1:03:50 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:03:50 That's not really hard.

Neal Brennan 1:03:51 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:03:51 That is easy to ignore. It's easy.

Neal Brennan 1:03:53 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:03:53 Like, you have the option to ignore it and life goes on.

Neal Brennan 1:03:55 Well, your brain can't even-

Joe Rogan 1:03:57 Or you have the option to take it all in.

Neal Brennan 1:03:57 Your brain's like, "Yo, I can't worry about it."

Joe Rogan 1:03:59 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 1:03:59 Like, you could, you'll have a flash of it.

Joe Rogan 1:04:01 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 1:04:01 And be like, "I can't, we can't, fuck it." Dude, you're g- you gotta breathe and you gotta get the... Or you're gonna perish.

Joe Rogan 1:04:06 Yeah, but you also gotta do difficult shit. Th- you do difficult shit to change what your watermark is. Like, what, what's your, your mark of, like, normalcy? And if your ability to handle difficult situations and discomfort is at a very low level, you are going to be miserable forever. You've got to elevate your ability to withstand discomfort, so that things that are discomfort, very discomfortable for most people-

Neal Brennan 1:04:35 You raise the bar continuously.

Joe Rogan 1:04:36 ... they aren't as bad for you.

Neal Brennan 1:04:37 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:04:37 They aren't as bad for you. And if you can get there, it's a better place to be. It's a-

Neal Brennan 1:04:41 You just make yourself resilient by-

Joe Rogan 1:04:43 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 1:04:44 ... just, it's like the, throwing the medicine ball in your stomach and just fucking getting the fucking-

Joe Rogan 1:04:48 Yeah, you're getting, like, mental r- like if you have, if you're doing, like, endurance work on a bike, like doing sprints on one of those Airdyne machines, (breathes heavily) you are, you ha- or you're not capable of thinking of anything else.

Neal Brennan 1:05:00 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:05:00 You're barely surviving those workouts. You're like, "Fuck." There's these things called Tabata sprints. It's a great protocol for developing endurance. And you do a 20-second sprint followed by 10 seconds of rest. It's the shortest 10 seconds you'll ever experience in your life.

Neal Brennan 1:05:16 Uh-huh.

Joe Rogan 1:05:16 'Cause then right after that is another 20 seconds.

Neal Brennan 1:05:18 Yeah. Even the, I do high interval training for just running.

Joe Rogan 1:05:21 Oh.

Neal Brennan 1:05:21 You just sprint for, for a minute.

Joe Rogan 1:05:23 Mm-hmm.

Neal Brennan 1:05:24 And then not for a minute, and you're like, "Boy, that was a pretty quick not."

Joe Rogan 1:05:28 (laughs) Yeah.

Neal Brennan 1:05:28 That fucking slowdown was not... I think they fuck with the clocks a little bit on that one.

Joe Rogan 1:05:33 Yeah. It's, time is relative. It's very relative.

Neal Brennan 1:05:36 So, how do you deal with, how did you deal with the Spotify, th- what's that day like? The, the day of, uh, the boycotts and all that stuff? 'Cause I don't, I haven't spoken, I don't know if you've spoken about it at all, but, uh...

Joe Rogan 1:05:51 It was, it was, uh, they had never experienced anything like that before, so it was interesting to see how they would handle it. They handled it really well. And, you know, again, like, when I made that video, where, the, the big one was, like, Neil Young and Joni Mitchell.

Neal Brennan 1:06:06 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:07 And when I made that video, like, o- one of the things I really wanted to get out there was that a lot of the things they were saying were misinformation. Like, that's a shit word. It's a shit term. We're talking about things that are proven to be true now.

Neal Brennan 1:06:20 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:06:21 And when I was talking about them, a lot of the things that I was talking about were already on the cover of Newsweek. Like, that was the one that masks don't work. Or, uh, no, the cover of Newsweek was, uh, the lab leak hypothesis.

Neal Brennan 1:06:33 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:06:33 And then on CNN, they were saying cloth masks don't work. There's, all things that I-

Neal Brennan 1:06:37 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:06:37 ... had read and talked to people about-

Neal Brennan 1:06:40 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:40 ... before. I'm like, you gotta recognize, like, what you're calling disinformation, six months from now, could be just accepted fact.

Neal Brennan 1:06:48 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:06:49 And that's what we're seeing over and over and over again with this. So, there was this...... it was very strange to experience that because I, I could tell that this was not-

Neal Brennan 1:06:58 But you also knew you couldn't get in the weeds. You couldn't even-

Joe Rogan 1:07:01 ... get in the weeds.

Neal Brennan 1:07:01 It's not like one of the-

Joe Rogan 1:07:01 You can't get in the weeds. You can't get in the weeds. You can't... You can't go over reading the things that people are saying or watching things people are saying. It's like, "That's not good for you."

Neal Brennan 1:07:07 Or even counter that you can't argue. Like, I... What'd I, what did I say? I said cloth masks, and I said... Like, you can't...

Joe Rogan 1:07:13 You gotta let other people do that. You, you be yourself. Expre- but if you have to expre- if you feel like you didn't express yourself correctly, or if you feel like there's something more to say about it, definitely do that too. But to counter all the different points of criticism, and also, that's a game dummies play. There's a dummy game, and that dummy game is attack you so that you have to respond back to them.

Neal Brennan 1:07:34 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:07:34 It's like, "Oh."

Neal Brennan 1:07:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:07:36 "You're so clever."

Neal Brennan 1:07:38 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:07:38 It's trolling.

Neal Brennan 1:07:39 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:07:39 And it's... You only do it when you don't have other things to contribute. When people aren't really interested in your personality or your perspectives or the way you word things or talk about things, then you gotta just go st- start talking shit about people and starting shit with people-

Neal Brennan 1:07:54 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:07:54 ... and hope they respond. And there's like a whole ecosystem of people talking shit to each other and responding-

Neal Brennan 1:08:00 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:08:00 ... and then becoming friends. It's like, girl...

Neal Brennan 1:08:03 And by the way, the friendships are, uh, not the sturdiest-

Joe Rogan 1:08:07 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:08:09 ... I'll say. Let me just say-

Joe Rogan 1:08:10 It's a silly way to live your life.

Neal Brennan 1:08:11 ... we've learned in the last couple years, they, these friendships are not very, uh...

Joe Rogan 1:08:16 Robust.

Neal Brennan 1:08:16 Yeah. Well, that's what I always say about you. It's like, I've known him 30 years. He's fucking nice to me.

Joe Rogan 1:08:24 (sucking sound) (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:08:24 And I am nice to him. We are unlikely animal friends, but I... He's nice. I respect him. He respects me. I can look you in the eye, know it's true, and, and I don't... That so when people... The amount of like wokey, lefty, uh, people that will fucking write you off in a second.

Joe Rogan 1:08:46 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 1:08:46 That, it's like, are-

Joe Rogan 1:08:47 That's okay.

Neal Brennan 1:08:48 Yeah, it's okay. But you just gotta... Okay.

Joe Rogan 1:08:49 There's plenty of things to like in the world.

Neal Brennan 1:08:51 Of course.

Joe Rogan 1:08:51 You don't have to like me. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:08:52 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:08:52 It's okay.

Neal Brennan 1:08:53 No. Yeah. Yeah. But I'm saying like-

Joe Rogan 1:08:55 It's okay.

Neal Brennan 1:08:55 ... there's a r-

Joe Rogan 1:08:55 But I do... I represent that masculine energy that is so, so dangerous in today's society.

Neal Brennan 1:09:01 Uh-huh. Yeah. Yep. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:09:02 And I also represent being nice. I think it's important to be nice.

Neal Brennan 1:09:06 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:09:06 I think it's super important. I also th-

Neal Brennan 1:09:08 And by the way, they're not mutually exclusive. In fact-

Joe Rogan 1:09:10 They're not. They-

Neal Brennan 1:09:11 In fact.

Joe Rogan 1:09:12 Yeah. When you're stronger, you have more of an ability to be nice, you know? You really do. Because when you're, you're more controlled and more, um, confident in yourself, you have more of an ability to forgive people 'cause there's a strength in that. Just like-

Neal Brennan 1:09:27 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:09:28 ... "Oh, fuck off. Come on, relax."

Neal Brennan 1:09:29 Are you a grudge person?

Joe Rogan 1:09:30 No.

Neal Brennan 1:09:31 I'm a big one.

Joe Rogan 1:09:32 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 1:09:33 Big grudge guy.

Joe Rogan 1:09:33 Not at all. Not at all. No. Um-

Neal Brennan 1:09:36 Do you see... What about when people say, "We need to move on. We need to put that behind us," and all that stuff? If somebody fucks with you and then goes, "Let's just... Let bygones be bygones."

Joe Rogan 1:09:46 Some people just like to do that over and over again.

Neal Brennan 1:09:48 Well, that's what I'm saying.

Joe Rogan 1:09:49 That's a problem with some people.

Neal Brennan 1:09:50 Past is furlough.

Joe Rogan 1:09:50 Some people, they want to... Uh, they want to get involved in conflicts and then make up. You know? Like if you've ever had a girlfriend like that, that wanted to fight and, you know-

Neal Brennan 1:09:59 Only know, only know.

Joe Rogan 1:10:00 A lot of boyfriends do it too.

Neal Brennan 1:10:01 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:10:01 A lot of people do it where they'll... It's this... A normal sort of psychological roller coaster you put yourself on, where you start fights over nothing just so you can make up 'cause the making-

Neal Brennan 1:10:10 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:10:10 ... up is so intense.

Neal Brennan 1:10:12 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:10:12 Because it's like, "Oh my God. Is it... We're really gonna break up?"

Neal Brennan 1:10:14 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:10:14 "I don't wanna break up. I don't wanna break up either." And the next thing you know, you're making out and you're fucking and it feels like a... It's amazing.

Neal Brennan 1:10:19 I had to tell a woman like, "Hey, you don't like me."

Joe Rogan 1:10:24 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:10:26 (laughs) 'Cause she kept doing it. I was like, "Hey, you need to-"

Joe Rogan 1:10:28 Oh.

Neal Brennan 1:10:28 ... "take your own word for this. We don't get along good."

Joe Rogan 1:10:33 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 1:10:33 "You just gotta stop being like, 'Hey.' No."

Joe Rogan 1:10:37 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 1:10:37 "You don't l- I know how this ends."

Joe Rogan 1:10:39 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:10:39 "You yell at me for, uh, for nonsense and then-"

Joe Rogan 1:10:43 Oh.

Neal Brennan 1:10:43 "And then I plead my case. But once you're pleading your case, it's like, what am I..." You just, just feel... It's like you've already lost.

Joe Rogan 1:10:50 When you get stuck in a relationship where the other person likes to just berate you and badger you and insult you, which can happen male or female, right?

Neal Brennan 1:11:00 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:11:01 That is the worst place to be. That's one of the worst places to be.

Neal Brennan 1:11:05 It's, uh, it's a swamp. Unlike... It's real sticky.

Joe Rogan 1:11:10 It's a love swamp.

Neal Brennan 1:11:11 It's fucking real hard to get out of.

Joe Rogan 1:11:13 Oh.

Neal Brennan 1:11:13 It's a bog. Just (imitates wheel spinning) . Your wheels are turning.

Joe Rogan 1:11:17 Oh.

Neal Brennan 1:11:18 And you cannot... Because then they can go like, "So you giving up?" (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:11:22 Oh, God.

Neal Brennan 1:11:23 And you're like, "Fucking all right, I'll fucking do it another..." I'll, I, I... You know what gets a, actually like a, a pause break in my... In, in the new Block special? Is, uh, I go, "I've never been lonelier than in a relationship I didn't wanna be in."

Joe Rogan 1:11:38 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:11:39 And it... And people are like, "Yeah."

Joe Rogan 1:11:41 Oh, that's good.

Neal Brennan 1:11:42 It gets like a slow roller, like ooh.

Joe Rogan 1:11:44 That's good. That's good.

Neal Brennan 1:11:45 Uh...

Joe Rogan 1:11:45 That's so good.

Neal Brennan 1:11:46 'Cause-

Joe Rogan 1:11:46 That's so true.

Neal Brennan 1:11:48 Yeah. 'Cause I could be... I'm single, not married, no kids, and it's like, "Do I get lonely?" Yeah. But I've also...

Joe Rogan 1:11:55 You're also not miserable.

Neal Brennan 1:11:56 I know a... Yeah. And I know a lot of lonely married people.

Joe Rogan 1:12:00 Yeah. There's a great quote somebody said once, "I'd rather be alone than wish I was alone."

Neal Brennan 1:12:04 Yeah. Yeah. It's... Like the... Alone has its problems.

Joe Rogan 1:12:10 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 1:12:10 But it's, uh, it's very manageable.

Joe Rogan 1:12:14 It's certainly much more manageable than being in a shit relationship. Because if you're alone, you can meet someone nice.

Neal Brennan 1:12:21 Uh-huh.

Joe Rogan 1:12:22 But if you're in a shit relationship and you can't get out, you living together, uh-

Neal Brennan 1:12:25 And if you meet somebody nice, you gotta call a lawyer, Joe.

Joe Rogan 1:12:28 Oh no.

Neal Brennan 1:12:30 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:12:30 And you got your bills all tied up together, and maybe, you know, you're not married but you did buy the house together, like-

Neal Brennan 1:12:37 Oh.

Joe Rogan 1:12:37 Oh God. Oh God.

Neal Brennan 1:12:39 I had a girlfriend move in with me and somebody goes, uh, "Mark the date down." And I was like, "Why?" And they go, "'Cause California common law says that, uh, if you live together for seven years-... you're basically married.

Joe Rogan 1:12:59 Oh, my God.

Neal Brennan 1:13:00 And, uh-

Joe Rogan 1:13:01 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:13:01 And he goes, "It just happened to so and so, two days after-

Joe Rogan 1:13:06 Ah.

Neal Brennan 1:13:07 ... seven years."

Joe Rogan 1:13:08 Two days after seven years, they get hit?

Neal Brennan 1:13:10 Yep.

Joe Rogan 1:13:10 Wow.

Neal Brennan 1:13:11 Not married.

Joe Rogan 1:13:12 Nice. Maybe she'd have like a clock, like one of those digital-

Neal Brennan 1:13:14 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:13:14 ... clocks, like the-

Neal Brennan 1:13:15 Countdown.

Joe Rogan 1:13:15 ... like the Debt Countdown? (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:13:16 (laughs) Yeah, exactly.

Joe Rogan 1:13:17 It's just countdown to seven years. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:13:18 Babe, we gotta get the fuck out of here.

Joe Rogan 1:13:19 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:13:20 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:13:20 Five years in, you're like, "Whoa-

Neal Brennan 1:13:22 Boop.

Joe Rogan 1:13:22 ... I'm getting a little itchy."

Neal Brennan 1:13:23 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:13:24 This is dangerous.

Neal Brennan 1:13:25 Yeah. The, so, the-

Joe Rogan 1:13:27 So what happened with this friend? Did they, did someone file a, uh-

Neal Brennan 1:13:31 Uh-huh.

Joe Rogan 1:13:31 Oh, boy.

Neal Brennan 1:13:33 Uh-huh.

Joe Rogan 1:13:33 Looking for a big payday?

Neal Brennan 1:13:35 Uh-huh. And I think they got it.

Joe Rogan 1:13:36 Oh, my goodness. Wow. That's just stealing money from people. (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:13:42 It's, it's-

Joe Rogan 1:13:44 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:13:44 It's another thing that's in the, in the new special where I say you, it's like relationships are reliant on like, this is a shared thing.

Joe Rogan 1:13:53 Mm.

Neal Brennan 1:13:53 And then at a certain point, they go, "I've been pretending." And then you have-

Joe Rogan 1:13:59 Oh.

Neal Brennan 1:13:59 ... to look through it and try to figure out when they were pretending and when they weren't.

Joe Rogan 1:14:03 Mm.

Neal Brennan 1:14:03 And then you just have to accept like, oh, this might have all been a grift.

Joe Rogan 1:14:07 Mm.

Neal Brennan 1:14:08 And you, and I've seen it, it's happened to me, and not for money. Like, or not a lot of money. Uh, and I've seen it happen to guys I know with a lot of money, and they get-

Joe Rogan 1:14:19 It's a real thing.

Neal Brennan 1:14:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:14:21 Like p- people that look at someone who's got money, and you act like a predator. And you get close to them, and you pretend you like them, and you date them, and you fuck them. It's like a very high level of prostitution-

Neal Brennan 1:14:35 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:14:35 ... that people engage in.

Neal Brennan 1:14:36 It's, but it, uh, it's like I would, I, it, to me it has a lot more to do with sociopathy.

Joe Rogan 1:14:42 Oh, it does. Yeah.

Neal Brennan 1:14:43 It's-

Joe Rogan 1:14:43 For sure.

Neal Brennan 1:14:43 ... their, it's like-

Joe Rogan 1:14:44 Yeah.

Neal Brennan 1:14:45 ... what did you do?

Joe Rogan 1:14:46 But then you just also got the ego of the guy who thinks this like super-

Neal Brennan 1:14:50 I earned it fair and square.

Joe Rogan 1:14:51 ... bomb ass-

Neal Brennan 1:14:52 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:14:52 ... 30-year-old woman-

Neal Brennan 1:14:54 Fair and square.

Joe Rogan 1:14:54 ... is into him.

Neal Brennan 1:14:54 I always got hot chicks, bro.

Joe Rogan 1:14:57 (laughs) That's like, that's on you, stupid.

Neal Brennan 1:14:58 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:14:58 Like look at that f- look at, this isn't, of course this isn't a fair fight.

Neal Brennan 1:15:02 Well, that's whenever I'm on dating apps, I just go, "Have I ever dated someone who looks like this?"

Joe Rogan 1:15:06 (laughs)

Neal Brennan 1:15:06 Like in this area of hotness? And if I have, then I'll like 'em.

Joe Rogan 1:15:11 That's