By playing, you agree to uListen's Terms and Privacy Policy and YouTube's Terms of Service.
What Now? With Trevor NoahFor Kids or Anyone Who’s Ever Been a Kid | What Now? with Trevor Noah Podcast
Summaries, chapters, transcripts, and FAQs on this page are made by uListen, not YouTube.
Great conversations run long. Their best ideas don't have to.
uListen is free on iPhone, iPad, Android, Chrome, and Claude.
See howCHAPTERS
Chapter summaries
Kids Vote on Who Cries More
Trevor Noah polls a group of kids on whether kids or adults cry more, and the answers split between adults, kids and babies. A mix-up over a word one child isn't allowed to say leads Trevor to explain what a dam is.
- •Kids vote adults, kids, or babies
- •One child says parents cry when someone dies and kids cry when they lose something
- •A child can't spell a word her mom banned
- •Trevor explains the meaning of a dam
Seeing Childhood Through a Kid's Eyes
Trevor explains he wants to talk about kids from the kid's point of view rather than from an expert's. He describes a child absorbed in a box being pulled away, and asks a mother when she felt she truly became one.
- •Nobody is truly an expert on kids and parenting
- •A child at play is working, and being interrupted is like a giant lifting you from your office chair
- •The guest says she became a mom when she brought her son home and breastfed him
- •Trevor and the guests joke about the difference between how mothers and fathers are irreplaceable
When Parents Stop Looking Like Superheroes
A speaker tells of his dad's botched string-and-door attempt to pull his loose tooth, which made him wonder whether his dad had a plan. Trevor and others discuss when they first saw their parents as fallible, with Trevor recalling a car accident he saw coming.
- •The loose-tooth story made a child doubt his dad's plan
- •One guest saw her parents as people only in her early 20s
- •Trevor saw his mom as fallible from about age five or six
- •Trevor stayed silent as a car approached and was told he must speak up
Parenting as a Gamble: Nature, Nurture and Lack
Trevor says Esther Perel told him that however you raise a child, some lack gets created. The group debates whether parenting is like rolling dice and whether a child's temperament is simply hardware they're born with.
- •Some people are in therapy for too much freedom, others for too much structure
- •Parenting is compared to gambling with dice
- •A guest argues children arrive with their own wiring
- •Having been a child is valuable perspective even for non-parents
Introducing the Kids Panel and What Kids Think Jobs Are
Trevor introduces his new children's book and the panel of kids he sat down with. He finds that many children are left in the dark about their parents' work, and they describe adult jobs as boring typing on computers.
- •Trevor wrote a children's book about how a child sees their relationship with their parents
- •He chose to talk directly to kids
- •Kids imagine jobs as hanging out on a couch or typing on a computer
- •Trevor compares the kids' picture of work to a chicken coop for humans
Defensive Parenting and the Lost Village
The conversation turns to how parents get defensive about strangers correcting their children. The guests contrast that with communal upbringings in which aunties, church elders and the wider community shared responsibility, and failure or success was collective.
- •Josh recalls his mom thanking strangers who corrected him
- •Parenting is a hard job yet parents resist outside input
- •A guest was looked after by church grandmas and uncles who weren't related
- •Today's nuclear family makes a child's failure feel like an indictment of the parent
What Kids Wish Adults Understood
Trevor asks the kids why grown-ups don't understand them. One girl says parents live through their kids' futures and should let them be responsible for themselves. Guests then reflect on whether their own parents understood them and on a mother admitting she is not enough for her children.
- •One kid says grown-ups are boring and say no to chocolate
- •Another says parents try to protect the future instead of living in the moment
- •A guest's dad sparred with her intellectually and saw her intensity
- •A mother says she is at peace with not containing everything her children need
- •She says parents should seek input from friends without kids
Kids Aren't Doing Wrong, They Need Space
Guests discuss how a child's trouble could be redirected, such as fighters who got into trouble at school before finding wrestling. Trevor argues that nothing a child does is wrong but that the space for it hasn't been created, citing his own habit of dismantling things.
- •Fighters who got in trouble for fighting could have been steered into wrestling
- •Trevor says he doesn't think any child's behavior is inherently wrong
- •Dismantling a TV could become an electronics class
- •Most kids aren't being malicious, just curious
If You Could Change the World: Kids' Answers
Trevor asks the kids what they would change about the world, and they give serious answers like ending world hunger, shelter for everyone, and starting everyone with enough money. One kid says more cheese. Trevor and the guests reflect on how worldly the kids are and on seeing without being bogged down.
- •Answers included ending world hunger and providing safe places to stay
- •One kid proposes everyone start with enough money, like in the game Life
- •Trevor was proud but saddened that the kids' answers were so adult
- •A guest says there are no real grownups and kids ask valuable questions
- •Adults get bogged down, like a homeowner opposing new housing
Who Do You Get Your Spirit From?
After the coffee segment, the guests talk about being told they resemble a relative they barely knew. They discuss Southern and African similarities, names tied to reincarnation, a son who mirrors his grandfather, and Trevor's resemblance to his grandfather and dad.
- •A guest has been told he reminds people of a grandfather he never met
- •Yoruba and Igbo names can signify a returned relative
- •One guest sees her father's mannerisms in her son
- •Trevor was told he is like his grandfather, who was bipolar, and his dad, whom he saw little of
Ask Your Kids How You're Doing
Kids answer what adults struggle to understand, with Juniper saying parents downplay things like school disappointments. Trevor argues kids are perceptive and lenient, and suggests parents ask kids for feedback, like an end-of-year review, before the episode closes with jokes and goodbyes to the kids.
- •Juniper says parents tell her to read a book when she's hurt, and don't grasp her feelings
- •Trevor says kids are perceptive and tell you who you are
- •He suggests parents ask their kids what they could improve
- •Guests describe how earnestly kids say they miss you
- •Trevor jokes about making kids, and thanks the panel
