Joe Rogan Experience #1789 - Tom Papa
Narrator, Narrator, Joe Rogan (host), Tom Papa (guest), Guest (unidentified additional voice) (guest), Narrator, Narrator, Narrator
In this episode of The Joe Rogan Experience, featuring Narrator and Narrator, Joe Rogan Experience #1789 - Tom Papa explores joe Rogan and Tom Papa Trade Bread, War Fears, and Wolfmen Jokes Joe Rogan and comedian Tom Papa have a sprawling, free‑flowing conversation that bounces from homemade sourdough and airport oddities to pandemic stress, airline meltdowns, and the Russia‑Ukraine war.
Joe Rogan and Tom Papa Trade Bread, War Fears, and Wolfmen Jokes
Joe Rogan and comedian Tom Papa have a sprawling, free‑flowing conversation that bounces from homemade sourdough and airport oddities to pandemic stress, airline meltdowns, and the Russia‑Ukraine war.
They reflect on how COVID and global conflict have warped people’s anxiety, discuss nuclear brinkmanship and historical catastrophes, and compare the toughness of past generations with today’s fragility.
The episode detours through sports (UFC, golf, baseball, soccer riots), gambling scandals, and modern body obsessions, then lands on aging, hormones, fitness, and the death of the big theatrical comedy movie.
Throughout, they keep it comedic and irreverent, mixing serious worries about war and civilization with stories about werewolf movies, stunt injuries, overeating pizza, and why “dad bod” surveys are lies.
Key Takeaways
Modern stressors stacked on already-anxious lives are pushing people to breaking points.
Rogan and Papa argue that many people were already medicated or struggling before COVID; adding a pandemic, mask rules, and now war has created a level of chronic stress many can’t process well.
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Nuclear deterrence is only comforting if leaders are rational and constrained.
Their Russia–Ukraine discussion centers on Putin’s limited options, huge arsenal, and isolation, raising the unsettling question of what actually stops a single volatile leader from escalating to nuclear use.
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Perspective and small daily tasks can stabilize people in chaotic times.
They repeatedly come back to the idea that focusing on simple routines—work, cooking, caring for family—helps individuals cope when the big picture (pandemics, wars, climate) feels overwhelming.
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Exercise and physical maintenance are essential mental‑health tools, not vanity.
Both emphasize that working out, stretching, and even hormone replacement aren’t just about looks; they significantly reduce anxiety, improve recovery, and keep aging bodies functional and less fragile.
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Body image issues and addiction to ‘health’ can become just as destructive as classic vices.
They cite a fitness YouTuber who effectively worked and dieted himself to death, plus gamblers and steroid abusers, to show how obsession—whether with money, muscle, or leanness—can be fatal.
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Social media backlash has effectively killed the big, edgy theatrical comedy.
Comparing films like ‘Hangover,’ ‘Superbad,’ and ‘Step Brothers’ to today’s landscape, they argue studios are too afraid of outrage to greenlight R‑rated comedies that rely on offensive or risky humor.
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Humans are still wired like ancient warriors but live in cubicles and on screens.
Rogan frames much modern dysfunction—rage, anxiety, addiction—as the clash between our evolutionary design for danger and physical hardship and our current sedentary, hyper‑online, comfort‑obsessed lives.
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Notable Quotes
“People lost their fucking minds over the last two years.”
— Joe Rogan
“The hardest thing that’s ever happened to you is the hardest thing that’s ever happened to you.”
— Joe Rogan
“We were just coming out of COVID, it was all starting to feel hopeful, and now, goddamn… What are you doing, man?”
— Tom Papa (about the Ukraine war)
“It’s like if Hitler had nukes—he’s still got this horrible weapon at the back of it.”
— Tom Papa (on Putin and nuclear weapons)
“That survey saying women prefer dad bods is horse shit.”
— Joe Rogan
Questions Answered in This Episode
How convincing is Rogan and Papa’s comparison between today’s nuclear tensions and the Cuban Missile Crisis—are we really that close to catastrophe?
Joe Rogan and comedian Tom Papa have a sprawling, free‑flowing conversation that bounces from homemade sourdough and airport oddities to pandemic stress, airline meltdowns, and the Russia‑Ukraine war.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
To what extent did pandemic policies (like mask mandates and flight alcohol bans) actually fuel, rather than reduce, public anxiety and bad behavior?
They reflect on how COVID and global conflict have warped people’s anxiety, discuss nuclear brinkmanship and historical catastrophes, and compare the toughness of past generations with today’s fragility.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
Is it possible to revive hard‑R, transgressive movie comedies in the current social‑media climate, and what would that realistically require from studios and audiences?
The episode detours through sports (UFC, golf, baseball, soccer riots), gambling scandals, and modern body obsessions, then lands on aging, hormones, fitness, and the death of the big theatrical comedy movie.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
Where is the line between disciplined self‑improvement (fitness, diet, hormones) and harmful obsession that risks long‑term health?
Throughout, they keep it comedic and irreverent, mixing serious worries about war and civilization with stories about werewolf movies, stunt injuries, overeating pizza, and why “dad bod” surveys are lies.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
Does the idea that we’re ‘Stone Age minds in a modern world’ adequately explain rising rates of anxiety, addiction, and violence—or is that too reductive?
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
Transcript Preview
(drumming) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out.
The Joe Rogan Experience.
Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day. (rock music plays) And we're up. Oh, hi Tom Papa.
Oh, good to see you, Joe.
You are the man that brings the bags.
Ah.
You bring, you bring the brown paper bags, and-
Joe, I was so happy to bring you bread that I was in Colorado doing shows, flew home, had my wife feed the starter. I shoulda come right here. But I w-
Feed the starter?
But I wouldn't have (laughs) been able to bring you bread. So I flew home... (laughs) This is so sick. I flew home just for 24 hours so I could bake the bread and then, uh, get back on a plane and bring it to you.
Wow.
But I feel like you haven't had it in so long.
You're the only one I'll eat bread from.
I know.
Uh, no, I'm not, I'm lying. I had a piece of bread-
(laughs)
... this, uh, Saturday after the fights. I did have a piece of bread with butter.
(laughs)
It was pretty damn good.
Well, I, uh, I'm happy to do it. And I've, I made a, I made one regular loaf, I'm not sure which is which. But one regular loaf and one olive loaf.
Ooh.
Which has green and kalamata olives, lemon zest, and herbs de Provence. And I hadn't made that in probably a year, and that, the house was just filled with the smell of the bread.
Mm.
It was so great. And then (laughs) flying here, the only thing in my carry-on was bread.
Wow.
I looked, 'cause it baked yesterday. Here, I'll let you open it with your hands.
Oh my goodness.
And, uh, yeah, if-
It's so dense.
If Jamie, if Jamie could get a piece of it, he would probably be grateful.
Did TSA check that hard or was there clear to pull it?
(laughs) It smells so good, it filled my hotel room up.
Yeah.
(laughs) You could bake fentanyl in there.
(laughs)
(laughs) .
So let me see which one that is. Does that have olive on it?
I think this is olive.
Yeah.
It's the olive one, yeah.
Doesn't that smell beautiful?
It does. It's so dense.
Yeah, it's a pretty heavy bread.
I was reading about a woman who got caught at the border. She had a, uh, she's a pregnant lady.
(laughs) Yeah.
And she had a, like a rubber container filled with fentanyl stuffed up her cooch.
(laughs) What?
Yeah.
Oh my god.
Which, you know, that stuff kills you if it's just a small amount.
Geez.
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