598. Why Geoff Norcott Felt Forced to Self-Censor

98% of the comedians are left-wing and then there's just you, who's not. I really gave a shit and then Brexit happened and I voted leave and then everything changed. The BBC and other places were like, hang on. it was just a tragic story really but in the 2010s it lost its balls comedy people were genuinely worried truth is i probably did self-center during that period and and and that it's not something i'm proud of what did happen with that evo santino

Should there be a minister for men? And then, and then Lawrence Fox there, that whole thing with GB News. I wouldn't shag that. That moment was just a really, a really bizarre moment. I know it's annoying when creators ask you to subscribe, but since I started, the channel's grown 10 times faster. If you don't sub, YouTube probably won't show you the next episode. It's free and takes two seconds. Hit subscribe. Jeff Norcott, welcome to the show.

It's good to be here. What does one say to that? Welcome to the show. What can you say? I was a little bit sideswiped. That is the cleanest start to any show I've ever done. Good. Yeah, let's crack into it. I think I saw Chris Williamson do that. He was just like...

you know, Matthew McConaughey. Well, in a lot of television industry, there's a lot of fanning around, frankly. A lot of records that run for like three hours and stuff like that. I was actually doing a thing with Jeremy Clarkson where I was writing for Clarkson on TV. Oh, yeah. And they had this classic long record.

And they said like, and he's like, doesn't piss about, he's a big figure. And then, so they said to him, could you say this, Jeremy? We're almost certainly not going to use it. And he said, well, if we're not going to use it, why the fuck am I saying it? And I was like. Unbelievable. Someone finally said it. But that's the level of status you have to have in the TV industry to point out the bleeding obvious. And then he got in a fight with his producer, didn't he? This was after that.

So I definitely made sure I brought in the right dinner. There you go. I promised I wouldn't crack gags too early because I'm doing the disco thing. But that would imply that I've told you not to and I haven't. No, no, no. I love this show and I want to... these these these chats but uh it's some thing thing from childhood where i need to puncture every moment you're a comedian yeah so and i love you i think i love i've been watching you for years and you're one of the best there is on on tv um

And I was just going to say, you just met my whole family. You had a bit of a baptism of fire. Yes, that was. I don't know, was that choreographed to sort of put the reduces on me? But yeah, your dad, your stepmom, right? And your sister, your wife and your dog. Yeah. That's mad. And you got one of those dogs in a bag, but I'm not going to judge. Well, I am going to judge. It was disgraceful. Yeah, it's a bit much, isn't it?

sort of lapdog. It's quite liberal elite, I would say. It is, yeah. Well, I was about to make you a tea and first of all, that was even more liberal elite. Yeah, I mean, that was disgraceful when you said, how do you make a cup of tea? That is, yeah. I mean, I still don't know how to react to that. And I didn't know what to say because I looked in the little fridge. And it's not actually, it's not me. That's what we've only got.

It was like soy or whatever. No, you're an intellectual. Why would you bother with knowing how to make tea? Yeah, but I make no qualms about it. I think maybe that is my thing. I do sort of have effects that are kind of liberal elite-y, but they're not my views.

Yeah, look, I might be probably non-binary. You know, I'm sort of a splinter cell working behind enemy lines, according to a lot of people. Maybe there's some truth in it. Well, this is it. For those who don't know, I mean, you're a comedian. You aren't often known.

as the one kind of conservative comedian that's allowed on the BBC. Is that right? There's that German guy who's great as well. Henning Vane. He's really good. Yeah, I would say. I mean, I can't speak for Henning, but certainly the way that some of his views presents would appear to be.

at least small c conservative uh there's simon evans as well oh yeah brilliant and if you look at something like news quiz they have andrew doyle andrew is politically left-wing maybe culturally a bit more conservative so i'm not the only one But look, I wouldn't push back on the idea that, yeah, I've been lucky to get, you know, a fair bit of exposure through that means. How did that sort of happen? So I started talking about my politics in 2013. There've been a few...

like accounts of my career that have said that i just saw the brexit thing and then jumped into it because in a sort of cynical way i was no i was cynical long before that i it was it was actually 2013 and my wife i was doing the leicester comedy festival and i said to my wife

like i because i was very club comic then which i loved by the way and still love club comedy is a great scene but i feel like i've got to do something more you know like challenge myself and she said well you voted conservative that was a bit weird for

your lot. And I was like, yeah, I suppose it is. So I did 10 minutes at that show about... having a secret cameraman hiding in the cupboards they won't have heard that on the microphone and there was a noise back there and I think it was probably to do with me trying to put the kettle on it's somebody from the BBC just checking what I'm saying as per my contract. But I went and did it. I did 10 minutes at a Leicester comedy festival and it was exciting.

You know, it was a completely new thing. It was, I felt unpopular in the room. Just saying that I voted conservative. I'll be honest, I don't think I had very good material on it. I didn't, the only joke I had. that really stood the test of time was, I vote conservative, but I'm not a Tory. I'm a cunt, but with a small c. Which now, some of the right might be annoyed with that because it's sort of self-deprecating, but I still think at least it was a decent joke. It had a good structure.

And that got nominated for Best New Show at Leicester. And I just sort of thought, well, that's kind of interesting. And then the then commissioner of Radio 4 said, where are all the right-wing comics? And I was like, this was after, by the way, whereas a lot of people thought it happened before. And I just...

done it because she'd said that. And then, so I spent a couple of years just talking about that kind of stuff, did a couple of Edinburgh shows. No one was that fussed really, because it's easy to forget that during the coalition years. The Tories weren't re-toxified yet. It was austerity that people didn't like. It was the bull in the club. It was the poshness of it all. So no one really gave a shit and then Brexit happened. And I voted leave. I wouldn't put myself down as like a...

You know, I wasn't ideologically committed to it. I was asked a binary question and I came down on the side of leave, not by a huge margin, but in the end, that was where I came down. And then everything changed. I think then maybe the BBC and other places were like, Hang on. So did things change in terms of that? I think so, yeah. Being invited to... So do you feel a little bit like, to an extent...

You were, I guess, invited as a kind of token, providing that the butt of the joke was sometimes conservatives themselves. Like, hey, I'm a conservative, but we can all laugh. If the butt of the joke had been... lefties, or maybe you're telling me it often was, would that have been more difficult? No, it was definitely a mix. If you think about the MASH report, so I did that show in 2016 at the Edinburgh Fringe, and that was the first one I had that was...

critically well received and typically the Edinburgh Fringe was the least funny I've ever done. But it's a really hard thing for people to understand, but the Edinburgh Fringe, the Edinburgh Comedy Festival, laughs aren't the biggest thing. What? Genuinely. Like, it's not. It's not. If they see somebody making – if anything, it makes them slightly suspicious if you get laughs for a full hour. But, you know, somebody doing something challenging and –

creating a bit of tension in her and I fucking love all that. Stuart Lee going like that for an hour. By the way, I like Stuart Lee, but I did get annoyed because there was one bit where for half an hour he was going... Yeah, I think he lied down as well, like the long pauses. I mean, it's a great gig being Stuart Lee, isn't it? You can sort of like, if you can get your pauses right, you can stretch it out and you can say it's all the character of Stuart Lee. It's just, I mean, any...

gets to take the piss out of his own audience he's basically cracked the code but um but yeah i i i thought i you know the first week of doing that show i was thinking of going home because i was like this just isn't funny enough and then and then um

And then I got a couple of reviews say, oh, you can feel the tension in here. So I don't want tension. I want laughter, but that's the way the critical community works. And so that's, that's a kind of. I mean, people know the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, but that's comedy. It's very sort of lefty and intellectual, isn't it? Yeah, yeah. It was quite political then. It was not political at all recently, but... But they didn't allow two...

Am I right in saying two Jewish comedians to even appear? Yeah, the last festival was disgraceful. Yeah, I say, you know, let's be specific. It was one venue where there was staff that pushed back. There was a period where the staff pushback was happening. I think there's one comic, I don't have his permission to name it, but a good comic that appears on BBC stuff.

that the staff tried to get him cancelled. There's one that people will know about it, with Jerry Sadovich, where there was staff at the Pleasants. Was that him getting his, was he getting his willy? Yeah, I mean, doing all sorts of terrible stuff, but he's been doing that a long time. Jerry Sadovich, that's the act, is that he said...

and does the worst things. And the audience had paid, you know, the worst thing I thought was not the worst thing, but one of the terrible things was they just sort of canceled it. Like just, you know, there were ticket, there was a, I prioritize the audience and I thought it was disgusting.

that like they were just like right this performance has been cancelled on we have decided we have passed it down to you that you cannot absorb this or you can't perceive uh irony and that that was a pretty dismal moment

But yeah, then 2017 rolled around. I did Question Time. I did MASH Report that year. And yeah, certainly the first couple of appearances on MASH Report, I was maybe a little bit self-flagellated. Well, I wasn't self-flagellating. I was just... i was just sort of doing stuff that was from my act so i was saying things about the nhs that were you know especially brutal and then people kind of going oh he's ironically

showing what a terrible human he is. Well, they thought you were like a character doing it on purpose. Yeah. Well, the thing about that show was everyone was cranking it up to 11, but because there was somebody of the right that was on that show that was getting laughs from a studio audience in London, they had to post-rationalize it.

And so, oh, it's a character. I used to get that all the time. Oh, like Al Murray, the bar guy. I think they thought that. And I thought, well, yeah, character, but with the same name, clothes and opinion. So as far as that is a character. I mean, like all comedy.

taking one part of you and dialing it up to 11 right doesn't mean it's not true it means that you might have a passing thought which is a bit extreme but you did think it at least once and you think well i say that again in front of an audience it might be funny

That's interesting. Because I often hear, and I wondered exactly about that, it's the first time I've heard it said that way, because I think a lot of comedians sometimes do hide behind this. It's a character, and it is, like you say, but it's also, I mean, so Gervais...

often says I love Gervais I think he sometimes watches the show as well he follows and all of those things but he he will say like I'll cut guys as a character and I think well yeah but it's all those are your views to an extent I do think with comedians perhaps there was a criticism from the left which I think lands is that especially within the Rogan era and comedians having quite a lot of cultural sway is that

you know we're comedians until people like our opinions then we sort of luxuriate in the glory of being thought leaders until we get told off then we're comedians again so i do think i do think it probably lands as a criticism that maybe we've uh we've wanted our cake eating it as well. But then, you know, with Dimash Report, and it's funny because that show is a rep, you know, like it was almost like a standard bearer for like the anger from the right at that time.

And it did skew very left, but it's also true to say that it's still the first and only show, I think, on television that created a space, a regular space for somebody right or centre. And as it went on, and perhaps maybe I got a bit more confident in it. yeah i really i went for it and the producer of that who was like you know your kind of metropolitan liberal elite type guy he equally was pushing me to go further

There's so much going through my mind about that because I'm going, okay, but is he just doing that so that he can keep with all the lefties? I mean, we don't know yet when this is actually going to go out, this episode now, but we've just had this Tim Davies step down and the accusations are... at the BBC of left-wing bias, like total left-wing bias. I don't know what to do about that because all the lefties think that it's got a right-wing bias. Yeah, yeah.

But I suppose one way to look at it is, we were talking about this just before the show, another comedian was saying about, you know, it's 98% of the comedians are left-wing and then there's just you, who's not. So is that, I mean, would you say it's... Oh, well, one thing I would say is that there's almost no topical comedy on any television now. People might not have noticed because a while ago there was, there was far too many shows all coming from the same point of view, right?

There was like MASH report. There was, you know, there's last leg. Have I got news for you? Mock the week. Mock the week. And when it had a topical version. And yeah, I think it's a fair criticism to say that. The opinion pool there was quite narrow in some respects. But I mean, I would say I went on 8 Out of 10 Cats in its last ever topical series. I did a joke about...

sort of gender, you know, sort of when they kept it in the edit and stuff like that. So what I think there was, was an awareness perhaps in perhaps more senior staff of what needed to change. The problem is, it's like.

A lot of BBC stuff gets made, you know, especially the comedy stuff by production houses. You get to the point of like a producer and AP, their glory to the BBC and impartiality is nothing. You know, what they've got, they've got a way of seeing the world and they probably are what.

you know, to a large degree, people would see as liberal elites. So, you know, then I'm like, why do I give a fuck about representing a right-wing voice or somebody who voted Leave? So my experience is with the BBC. I mean, I can talk about Tim Davies. I've sat in rooms with him, with meetings with him.

I think the right seemed quite happy that he's gone. I would be careful what you wish for, though, because I got the sense from him. And, you know, people call me like, you know, BBC shill, paid to say this. they can think what they want but i sat in a room with him and i think he really got it you know he got the need to to have a broader range of voices a broader range of class i really think that but like one person getting that

And being able to enact that in an organization that big is another challenge altogether. I've heard similar things to what you're saying, but he actually, despite apparently quite a few mess ups, let's say, on his watch. was quite understanding of the fact that the BBC had moved too far to the left. Yeah, well, I mean, didn't he run to be a Tory councillor?

I think so. I think you might have Tory views. We'll check that. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, look, you could still be a fairly socially liberal conservative, which I would class myself as, but socially liberal in the way before it went a bit. But yeah, he certainly gave me the vibe. And you know, the meetings I had when I was on the diversity panel and I just, you know, I was on the diversity panel, which was kind of...

an interesting thing in itself. Yeah, it was funny, I think, looking back. What was that? What is a diversity? It was class. I was there to represent working class. And, you know, before anybody comes at me, I do, yes, live in a townhouse in Cambridge, sheer. Now I wish I lived in central Cambridge, but it was really funny that day. Cause, um, it broke like, like I, when they asked me to be on the diversity panel, um, I genuinely, and this is how naive I was, I thought.

It'll be a one-off chat, you know, I'll just swing by. I was already in London that day and I thought I would just go along and say a few words and, you know, it might be good for the old, you know, networking, totally self-interested. Sure. We'd all do that. Yeah. And then, and then like on the day that I was going for that.

thing i went walk the dog at 6am and like i was trending like it's super early in the morning because the press release had gone out and all the newspapers have made a big fuss and they'd all taken it in different ways so it was like I think the guardian was like, uh, Tory on the diversity panel, like as though they would be as though that's a protected characteristic. Um, I think, uh, the telegraph or like white man.

Like representing whiteness or something, which is a lot of pressure. Yeah. You know, there's a lot of us. A lot of us. And you actually said on the press release that I was there to talk about class, but they all... seem to just ignore it yeah yeah i mean you know it certainly goes so i was i was completely freaked out by that i arrived at this diversity meeting

Not used to that level of scrutiny. I'm not very good in, you know, like in the eye of a storm, stuff like that. It really freaks me out. What happens to you? I get like palpitations. Do you? Yeah, my body goes all tense and stuff like that. And I can't focus on my life. That's what bothers me is like I've got a wife and a son and I can't just be what I want to be around them. I'm just thinking just check again, just check the internet again.

um it happened again with after that politics live appearance which ended up with lawrence fox getting cancelled that was like another thing where i was standing next i wasn't like in the void but i was standing very close to it um and and yes i was on that diversity panel and it was interesting that was before tim davey was the dg and um yeah it was interesting uh it was supposed to be that because they'd had like race uh sex

disability and sexuality. And it took, I don't know how many panels before somebody went, maybe class. Now, if you're looking at things that could potentially hold somebody back in their life, like I would have thought that should have happened earlier personally, but.

so i went in there and it was great and all the people who represented the different groups they were really supportive of it like yeah this is this is meant to be and you know i did agree to like chatham house rules when i was on it so i can't i'm not gonna say exactly who but like There was certainly one person in there where it wasn't against me being there, but I certainly got a sense that that was not the priority. The BBC is such a news led organization.

you know, the higher ups there. Oh, so being a comedian, you mean you weren't? Yeah, in class. I just think that particular person perhaps came from a different tradition. But the moment Team David come in, it was very different and in a positive way. That's good.

Do you know my DEI story? Yeah, roughly, yeah. Just white man kind of thing. So there was like five years of every single production company at one point in the meeting. Yes, we'd love your ideas, but you're going to have to be off screen now.

while we put a minority on the screen. So the joke then was always, they always made the same jokes, these production guys, because they knew it was ridiculous as well. Everyone knows it's ridiculous, or at least a lot of people think. So the jokes would always be like, you know, are you sure you're not gay? We can't entice you. You know, then you're a minority. Or sometimes...

We could break your legs for you if you want. But nobody ever said to me, are you sure you don't have some sort of working class? Maybe that's about me, or maybe it's because of what you said. No, it's hard. I mean, look, one thing I am sympathetic to with BBC and any organisation trying to get to grips with class is...

is how do you assess it? You know, like if I look at you, I can tell you definitely a man, you know, I can say, these days, right? And I could say, you know, you can tell me you're straight or gay, you know, if you're disabled, some of that is visible, you know.

If you're black, that's visible. But class is a hard one to define. No one's really come up with an absolute metric. Yeah. It's surprising that nobody said to me, are you sure? Nobody asked. Yeah. Well, it might be in your voice, mate. It might be in my voice. I would say.

But even in the jokes, the jokes about we can break your legs, are you sure you don't have a different accent? Because I did have a different accent growing up, just because a bit of a Charmeleon kind of way, if I was with friends who were more sort of football lads and all that, I would go a little bit more like that way. And then if I was back at my...

my posh school, I'd be a bit more, you know, like that. So I could have put on the accent or whatever. I would love to hear it right now. Yeah, I was doing it for a bit. That's how I used to be. I remember, and this is the funny thing about class, I remember like being...

Must have been about eight. And my dad would take me to Tottenham games back when people could afford to go to those games. But we used to go to Tottenham. And then my brother started coming as well when he was like five. So I was eight. And so they couldn't get three seats together. So dad and brother. And then I was like...

eight seats down was the only place they could find a seat for me so so my dad took me over the first time and he he said to the guys around because you're going to be next to them all year it's a season ticket we had and it's just these fellas you know and uh my dad sort of left me then he sort of said oh this is andrew he's just going to be sitting there and then

he went off and I remember looking up and I said to these guys I was like alright lads how's it going how you doing yeah yeah big game today innit as an 8 year old I had the croaky voice as well and the problem was then I had to keep that up for like 10 years I was next to these guys. So for 10 years, my dad would be like, Andrew, do you want any sort of salmon bagels? And I'd be like, what's that dad for? You were identifying as working class. You were appropriating. I culturally appropriated.

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Yeah, I mean, it's kind of weird for me with diversity because, as I'm sure some of my critics would say, is without it, I wouldn't have a career, right? You know, I always thought it was a very... strong live comic but there certainly came a point in the 2010s where you know if you look to any production company's shopping list as you well know you know uh straight white middle-aged man wasn't high up up the list wasn't you know they were that's not to say there weren't loads still

getting loads of exposure. But the point was about, you know, where was new talent being found from? And it tended not to become becoming less from that pool. So but yeah, politics.

You know, it's no doubt like there was a lot of the career I have now is because of me talking about the radical act of having voted in line with a lot of people. I mean, I remember like after Brexit, it was definitely a shot across the bowels for... you know the kind of cultural establishment because i think everyone always understood that comedies are lefties you know that's that was how the alternative scene started

Right, understood. But not back in the day, though. Like Jim Davis and all that. Oh, yeah, no, if you go back to the 70s and the guys that played charity golf, yeah. So when did that happen? I guess when the alternative era, at the end, mid to late 80s, Rick Mell, people like that, when he kind of won that.

culture war and then it was just an inherited thing that no one questioned for a long time um but then you know all jokes kind of wear thin after a while the stories had been in a while topical comedy seemed to be coming largely from the same place to a lot of people

And then, but then Brexit happened. And I think the problem with Brexit was everyone had always gone, right. We get that the comics go left and then, but we knew that, you know, what about a third of left wing people have voted leave. And yet in the world of comedy, it was almost no one. And then you kind of go, hang on. It's like Marmite. You either love it or you hate it. Whereas the comedy world apparently all hated Marmite. Like almost all of them.

And so I had meetings, you know, and this is the thing is, is that there are smart people, you know, in these corporations that are like, this can't carry on. But I just wonder if maybe those conversations came a bit late because... By then, a lot of people had already migrated away from terrestrial comedy because there was competitors. There was YouTube, Netflix specials. People wanted the kind of edge.

and bite that comedy used to have and i think if you look you know from the beginning of the 2010s to where certainly even by the end actually um the drop-off in people getting their comedy from terrestrial outlets had fallen off a cliff. I guess the same point you make about if it wasn't for this, you might not have your position and your job. I wouldn't probably have this channel because people would be able to get this material on the BBC. Why would they?

come to youtube yeah yeah exactly it was um comedy became risk averse in the 2010s it really did at the worst possible time i mean i remember uh one of the edinburgh comedy awards that year that one of the course the the comedy award uh organizers spoke about one of the winners sort of setting the trend and this new generation of comics of what you can't say in comedy

And I don't know about you, but I would have always thought comedy is more about what you can say. There's one license that comedians have is to say the unsayable. That's not all comedy is, by the way. Some people have... characterized it is you're always upset and offending people. That's not really the objective either. But just like the jester would say stuff to the king that no one else could.

Maybe, you know, that's what we get to do. I mean, it should be said that Jester sometimes did get killed. oh yeah for overstepping the mark so it's not it's not totally secure do you think did that actually happen because i've heard is that well it just takes some thinking is a thin-skinned king doesn't it to thin-skinned king you know like you get short kings now

Anyway, see, this is me getting frivolous. Stay with the subject, Jeff. That's how my mind works. But yeah, it became risk-averse. I mean, I think if you look at a show like Mock the Week, right, a lot of comics, well, oh, I'm not sure about that show. It's a bit adversarial. It's a bit gladiatorial.

that's when the public loved it. Yeah. When Frankie wasn't holding back, you know, strong comics on there, you know, Russell Howard, like a great lineup every week. And I think that, yeah, comedy is such an instinctive thing. People don't really process it. They've laughed before they've thought about it usually. And so if you don't...

you know, tickle that funny button, people will just go elsewhere. And they did. And comedy, yeah, it was just a tragic story, really, was that comedy, I think it has got its bollocks back a little bit now, but in the 2010s, it lost its balls, comedy. Have you got examples? I don't want to put you in a spot because it's quite hard to think of, of maybe a joke you may have written where either you went, you know what?

this would do really well, but I'm not going to be able to say that. Do you know what? It's hard to think of specifics. I think that the truth is I'm not an edgelord anyway. So mostly things that I would say would be okay because I'm not, I wish I was like an out and out. edgelord you know someone like ricky or someone like that

But I'm not quite. I'm too scared of upsetting people maybe sometimes. And there's heart palpitations. But yeah, yeah. The truth is, it's not nice upsetting people. That's the truth of it. You have to go into bat for what you think. But that outcome is...

It's never a fun outcome. But I certainly think maybe around 2020, during the Great Awakening, there was a lot of talk of comics of, you know, people were genuinely... worried you know there'd been enough people that got in trouble for things that yeah if the truth is i probably did self-censor um during that period and and and that it's not something i'm proud of but you could just see what was happening around you i think now is a much healthier

time in a way um and i think that what's happened with comedy is that there is a different community you know there's comedy unleashed you know there's people on the right there's people on the sort of like contrarian side of comedy, there's podcasts, there's shows, you know. So in the end, it corrected, but it's at the expense of, I guess, the old bastions of terrestrial television. Not so much radio. I think like news quiz, I think probably.

deserves credit for having regular voices like myself on, you know, um, they, I think it makes it better as well. Cause if you get like kind of four people roughly the same opinion, all agreeing. It's not great radio, is it? No, that's true. But if I say something, you know, if I'm on there and then the lefty comic snaps back at me, great. That makes them look...

That makes their joke have higher stakes and mine. I think everybody wins. Have you ever had it where it gets a bit awkward and there's a bit of a fallout? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll say something. There was a recent record of something. i can't remember what it was um but i sort of pointed out you know like when doge was shutting stuff down i was sort of talking about the fact that you know the us what the us debt is um

and how much it was likely to get to and what that equated to the person. Maybe the problem is I didn't make a joke, but I did say, I did say that, um, you know, at some point it shouldn't be a surprise that someone said, uh,

maybe we need to work on this debt. It was kind of like, no one in the room wanted to hear it at that point. What were you on? What was this? I think it was on News Quiz, actually. You know, but if I'd have made a good joke, I don't know, but I just sort of made a point. Who kicked off at you? And no one kicked off. It's just really awkward. Oh, just silence. Yeah, just got nothing. But like I say, it wasn't really a joke. It was a point.

And that was me basically maybe betraying my own rules. I don't like this thing of comedy just kind of, you know, the clap to thing. You make a big grandstanding moral point. Well, then do something else then. You know, like comedy. I've always thought. it's an exchange system whereby the laugh is a token that you give to earn the right to say what you think because otherwise if you take away the laugh like why the hell would somebody care what a comedian thinks

Did you, as a kid, did you like making people laugh? Yeah, yeah, it started very early. I was, my first ever gig, in inverted commas, was, we were in the Isle of Wight, and it was quite a tricky family holiday.

and um they had a thing called a best cowboy competition which already sounds like a noncy fucking ruse yeah like yeah where some dodgy like blue coat had gone oh let's get all the little boys in stetson's but the um yeah it's a weird thing but they're like so i remember waiting backstage and all the other boys were a bit older

And they were going out there confidently with their holsters on and their Stetsons. And they were sort of aping American language. And they said, you know, my name's Brad and I come from Texas. And, you know, these kind of things. And I just sort of missed the point a little bit. And I went out and I said, my name's Jeffrey. Knock on from Essex.

Because I thought Essex, Texas, I got confused between the two. Oh, right. And I just remember this noise, like this, this laughter. And I remember like... It was accidental laugh. That was your first one? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Like, definitely. Like, like, I think laughing, you know, it's about people laughing with your...

you i think i started off with people laughing at me and it continued and it continued yeah yeah it continued but i remember feeling like at that point that something was right i'd made something better and um like it was like putting out a fire You know, the only problem was, and I learned this after my very first solo stand-up gig, was that...

Until I woke up the next day and the fire was burning again. But I was like, the first time I did a solo stand-up gig and it went well, I was like, that's it, I've resolved everything. And then you need it back. Does it need to be liked, do you think? Is there some kind of... Yes, yeah, definitely.

Which I see in myself, and that's why we do a lot of this stuff. Yeah, I hate it in a way about myself. I am a pleaser, really. And I suppose where I sit in comedy is somebody that's trying to bridge the lines. I'm not trying to cultivate... audience in an echo chamber or or just in a specific group i don't i don't really want all right wingers coming to see me i don't want all lefties either i always think

truthfully diversity in a comedy audience does tend to make for a better reaction you know age diversity by age is a great one as well i get on this tour get loads of um i get loads of like dads and mums coming with their kids like they're 80 which is unbelievable so greatest compliment But there is a part of me, it does also think like, maybe I'm the one comic they can both tolerate. Like neither of them actually like me that much, but neither of them.

Hate me. Seven out of 10. Yeah. Like, so the kid might say, oh, we go and see this funky kind of like a comic with dyed hair. And the dad's like, fuck that. And then he's like, oh, let's go and see, you know, an old school comic. The kid's going, I wouldn't be seen dead at that. So maybe I'm the compromise comic.

In the Michael McIntyre space. But I think people really love you and Michael McIntyre. I don't mean Michael McIntyre. I rate incredibly highly. My families can go to see him. Yeah, yeah. But I just think in terms of funny bones, I've never seen anything like it. He went to my school.

Yeah. Was he noticing stuff back then as well? He was 15 years older than me. Yeah. Going around the canteen going, yeah. It must have been like, the moment he starts talking, I start laughing. I mean, I am like, I love good comedy and I love the guys that can, you can play. play an arena with maybe a couple of exceptions. If you can play arena, you're good at it. Like if you can get that many people to buy tickets, you're doing something right. It's nuts. What did happen with that?

Tani, since Santina, when you were on that show. Politics Live, yeah. So I was on there in autumn 2023. and i was promoting my book and the book was quite a light-hearted book about masculine well it was more specific it was called the british bloke decoded and it had some serious bits in it about relationships and how men sometimes lack the emotional language to deal with when things are going wrong or how to articulate what they're not getting from relationships

But he also had silly stuff as well about why men don't use sunscreen and stuff like that. And I went on there and they were sort of talking about, you know, should there be a minister for men? And I was like, you know, I wasn't sure at that point. But I said, well, you know, there are life outcomes for men that are demonstrably worse. And I mentioned the fact that men were more likely to die during the pandemic, which I still think is a weird thing, like significantly more likely to die.

We heard about other sort of ethnic groups. We heard about even, probably not enough, but about people with disability. But we didn't hear about that simple difference in sex. Do we know why that is? Well, I suppose men, you know, habitually, their behaviours... They tend to be, I think, more obese. I think that they tend to have substance abuse problems, you know. More risk-taking as well. Yeah, yeah. There's a myriad of reasons. But the point, I suppose, is like...

If that was anyone else, you'd say, well, why is society making them like that? And the point I made was, whereas when it's men is why do they do it to themselves? It's a fundamental difference in the way that we see, you know, problems that men have. And she pushed back on a couple of things.

And I kind of like, I was a bit, if people want to watch it, it's on YouTube still. I was just sort of confused as to what was happening. I thought what I said was fairly straightforward, you know, and... And Ava, I know what Ava was doing. Look, by the way, you know, we spoke. The weird thing was I tweeted straight afterwards. And I said, you know, I think it was a still of my face saying, when you think you're making a simple point.

but everyone's arguing with you. And she said, no, you were. And she sort of. She sort of, not backed down, but she sort of said, look, maybe I got that wrong. And we sort of, within like an hour or two, we'd resolved to speak further and have a constructive discussion. She's quite reasonable, actually. Yeah, yeah, she is. She is. And we spoke straight afterwards and she...

Kind of made that point. And then what I thought was odd, you know, cause that moment started to go viral quite quickly after that. was on the other side, the former head of the TUC, she, she kind of like Ava got all the stick and Ava did get stick by the way, you know, people shouting, you know, she, she kind of went through a bit after that, but it was weird that she got all of it because from the other side.

Basically, I can't remember the lady's name, the former head of the TUC, she said to me, she started off by saying, basically, some of my best friends are male, which seemed to be her point. I was like, is this really happening?

And then she said, well, why don't you... This is genuinely what she said. She said, why don't you start an organization called Blokes Against Sexual Harassment? And I was like, it's live telly, you've got to remember. And this is before... things have redressed a little bit so i'm trying to process i'm like well of course that's like a bad thing who wouldn't think that was bad but i was also thinking well the acronym of blokes against sexual harassment would be bash um it'll be bash

So I'm in this surreal space thinking, is she taking a piss? I didn't know what her objective was. She might not have thought through Bash. No, and I do think... no no i definitely don't think if she if she had and she still said that then that is like mental but yeah but i kind of like come off of that and and it was kind of it was almost i mean maybe i felt like belittled a little bit and i do think you know even in the two years since then

talking about male issues has moved on dramatically. But there were some dinosaur-ish views. You know how many used to get called dinosaurs for being a bit, oh, you little lady, why don't you go and do some charity work? It was almost like that, what she said to me. Oh, you're with your...

Oh, bless, you know, maybe instead you could do this, like suggesting to me how I'd spend my time. I don't know. I'd worked with her a couple of other times, she's a perfectly nice enough lady, but that moment was just a really... a really bizarre moment. And then, so I was like, just walked back to Victoria station thinking, I wonder if anybody else thought that. And then suddenly it was going mad, like social media going like, uh, well not, not to, to a degree, but like,

there were like quite a lot of people going, a lot of people saying, I fucking, I normally hate Jeff Norcott, but, but he actually had a point here and, you know, it should be possible for men to talk, you know, men are more like to be homeless, substance abuse, deaths of despair, like the list goes on and on.

Like there's a huge list of life outcomes that are worse for men. And that's never to take away from the issues that we need to address with women. But the fact I always need to caveat that is sort of suggests part of the discourse landscape. And so then I got loads of people contacting me, you know, through emails and DMs and stuff. A lot of them were mothers, you know, like there were a lot of women very active in the area of male mental health.

Because they have like sons, uncles, brothers, like husbands that they're worried about, you know, like, and, and women are, you know, I think it is true to say more emotionally active in, in a caring way. I even see it in my wife. The older women, I guess she started to see me as almost mentally incapacitated. I don't know. Because we met 12 years ago, so we were young.

And now we're old or somewhere in between. And you've seen that difference where she's become a lot more empathetic towards issues for men. Whereas when you're a young woman, you're just told these horrible... blokes you know yeah yeah i think that um i think that there's plenty of people you know who can see that now and and ever more so and are glad that it's being spoken up about there was a couple of days of that you know

And then, and then Lawrence Fox there, that whole thing with GB news. Yeah. What was that? Where he made those comments. So I think it was him and Dan Wharton were having a con, you know, they were talking about the clip. Oh, they said, I wouldn't shag that. Yeah. Like, look, call me old fashioned gentleman. Like I just.

It's just, you know, like... No, it wasn't on. No. And I was like, I woke up, saw this all kicking off because it happened the previous night. And I was, you know, I was like, that's, you know. I was just gutted, basically. I was gutted it ended up like that.

Because that then became the story. And, you know, Ava was getting a lot of heat. It ended up in a lot of, you know, people losing jobs and all that sort of stuff. But there was a brief period like of 48 hours where there was a discussion happening.

And that was kind of frustrating in a way. That's like when you're having, like when you're a kid, you're having an argument with your mum and you're trying to be subtle and nuanced about it. And then your brother comes in to help you, but is not as subtle.

and makes it quite as angry. Yeah, because then it became about them and it wasn't about, can we start talking about the difficulties in articulating problems that men are having?

Did you speak to Lawrence? Do you know Lawrence? No, no, not really. He came on my podcast once. Okay. I think he would, I mean, because I think he said at the time, because I think part of it was the shag bit that people were upset with. Although it did come out that I think Ava, and I do apologise to her if I'm wrong, I think she had said something.

something similar in objectifying a man some years before. If not, I do apologize to her. I think that came out that she'd also said a thing like Lawrence had said about men objectifying in the same manner. So I think Lawrence... The shag bit's one bit. I think a lot of people were upset with that because it was so dehumanizing. And I think he said he means that as in somebody who held those views, not... ava themselves just to give yeah well i mean look the pushback of it was i mean and i saw

A lot of people on the right that were equally, you know, just said that's not okay. So I don't think it was a case necessarily of just an especially woke reaction. I do think you've got to have, you know, in the way that you talk about colleagues and people in public life, there's...

you know there are sort of standards we should try and adhere to but like i say that's to one side what i was just like right we were having a discussion you know like that clip was being looked at and people analyzing what came out of that but then

You know, it's interesting how things go. I just sort of, what a lot of people were contacting me saying, and this is going to sound a little bit David Brent, like, oh, you should do more of this. But they were sort of saying that somebody that looks and sounds like you, which I was like, no offense.

But like you should do more in this area. So since then, you know, that two years, you know, we did a charity event, you know, I've been... for a coalition for men and boys who are relaunching i don't know when this is going to go out but i'm going to be an ambassador for their new charity um and i've you know done a keynote thing at the men's sheds organization and so i've just sort of stayed in that world talking about

uh men's mental health and and you know i'm not alone it's it's become a more common thing but it's mad to think that you know even two years ago part of the reason that was a viral moment was because it was a bit like Yeah. You know, the men are getting a bit chippy. I wondered like, and what do you feel about this then?

And it's something I've only started thinking about recently, really, because I feel politically maybe quite similar to what you might be, or, you know, this view and that view, and I'm on this side and that, but I understand the nuances. Maybe a liberal in the 90s, I was maybe. Yeah, yeah. That's me. So individual liberty and every woman should have the same rights, the same men. But what if we have incentivized through our culture men and women to do...

roles that evolutionarily didn't suit us necessarily. So feminism is what I'm saying. Men have all the problems you've just mentioned. Women, I think, are less happy when they're asked about how happy they are than they were in the 1960s. Yeah, surveys are better. Yeah. And so it's a really hard one for us to navigate. Look, this is where maybe I'll sound a bit woo-woo.

is I think that our understanding of... So people say that gender is a construct, or certainly that was said for a while, but I think that I've always thought that those... characteristics whether it's women being more empathetic men being more competitive i thought that they were a consequence of biological sex so they weren't just a characteristic that we assumed because we saw some films that said us to do that

there's somewhere in us, right? Which is very old fashioned, possibly controversial or something. I think that's what I think. Yeah. But like what I, what, here's where it comes down to me. I ain't a scientist. I'm not going to play. I'm just a comedian, Karl. I should commit to this.

I think, like, if a salmon knows to swim back up a fucking stream... I just realised you said scientist. I thought you said Zionist. And I was like, where's this salmon going? That is not my will. From the river to the sea, salmon will be free. See, now you're doing the jokes. I'm trying to do the proper discourse thing. I would have tried to be a comedian because I think I have that same kind of needing people to like me. But I said this to Francis Foster, our friend as well.

how the fuck you guys get up there and, and say something that's supposed to be funny and they might not laugh, you know, but that's a sidetrack. Sorry, go on about the salmon to the river to the sick. Yeah. So the salmon somehow knows to do this. It doesn't know it in a linguistic form. It hasn't been passed down to it. It hasn't watched loads of films that were indoctrinating it into salmon rolls. It just knows that...

This is what we do as salmon. So I do wonder if in the fullness of time, we'll discover more about ourselves and our brains and how we're... we're wired and it might be interesting the impact that it has. And, and, and it, you know, it's just something that I definitely saw through teaching. I tried to, I think with teenage boys is to kind of. God, that's going to sound a bit fucking Hugh Edwards, but I was going to say to meet them where they're at.

No. Well, he literally did that, but you mean it in a figurative sense. Yeah, figurative sense. Like, what are you? How can I work with what you are? And that is a very small C conservative way of seeing the world, is what is the world? Forget how I wish it to be.

This is what makes me a conservative more than anything. It's that pragmatic, what is the world rather than the utopian view of it. That's it. And that's, that's, that is the difference between left and right. I mean, if you think that way, you are a conservative in some ways, I think. And I actually think weirdly.

um that's why stand-ups are all a bit conservative coded to use a normal word because that is what stand-up is supposed to do it's like forget all the on the niceties this is what's really going on so um i i always kind of

could see that teenage boys were motivated by different feelings. But when I was in teaching, schools had become, for want of a better word, like quite feminized kind of. space right part of this problem is a lot of men don't want to teach so men are part of this problem But I remember one lad when I was a teacher. I was off doing a course for like three days. Really good lad, you know, being brought up by a single dad who was a top bloke.

I come back and he was suspended. And I was like, why is he suspended? And they were like, well, because he hit a kid. And I was like, okay, you know, that's bad.

Uh, and then, so the dad come up to school and I had to kind of explain it to him. And he was like, would you know the context? And the context was this other kid like, was kept like squirting him with Ribena. And, um, and he kept doing it. And this, this lad had said, don't stop doing that. Gave him several warnings. And then finally he said.

If you do that again, I'm going to punch you, right? And then so the kid did it again and he's going to, he punched him. And so as a blokey bloke, I'm sitting there going, problem? You know, I don't see that. you know what my mum would have called the law of the playground, you know, playground politics. But the school I was at at that time, it's very much like there's never an excuse for violence. I was like, oh. you know you probably shouldn't do it but like let's be real here

But what really got me was the fact that he got suspended, but the other kid, nothing happened to him. So yeah, that was another reason where perhaps I realised teaching as a whole made me realise that I was a bit more conservative. That's really interesting because you've just described Israel-Palestine in the most amazing analogy. Right, being a punch. This is how I work. I'm working on several levels at one time. But all of being a teacher made me more conservative, actually.

And it's weird because it's seen as such a left wing profession. But the moment I went in there, I was like, oh, actually, they don't need me to be there, mate.

They need me to insist that I call them, they call me sir. I need to wear a suit. I hate wearing suits, but I wore a suit. You know, I was relatively smartly dressed most of the time. It was all about discipline for me. You know, there were some schools when I was doing supply where they'd let kids... gives the kids loads of power that sometimes there will be kids on the um like if there's a job interview for a teacher they'd have kids sitting there

as part of the advocate. I was like, get the fuck, you know, like you're an adult. This is, your job is to take responsibility, you know, and to make decisions. So weirdly for me, like, you know, I said in my first book, that was part of realizing that I was, you know, conservative leaning at least. And also as well, at that time, everyone's got to go university. I was like.

Really? Like what? That's so arbitrary, you know, that the Blair era to say 50% of kids got to go university. But then it makes it not special. The moment half of people have got a thing is.

So 50% of students, university students, then have to go and do a PhD to differentiate themselves. Yeah, and also, you know, I could see with a lot of lads where you go, these are physical, you know, lads who their skill set is not necessarily in the academic world. And yet, you know... look in a weird way fair play to Keir Starmer I didn't think I was going to say that today

But he actually said in his speech about changing the balance of objectives for kids going to university. It's been a long time coming. It's really interesting what you're saying about basically defining left and right as utopia versus reality. I think that's such a nice way of putting it.

to sit around thinking that a better way is possible. I might sleep a bit better. We must look so evil to them to always be going no. Yeah, or sad. You know, because they're maybe going to bed. Yeah, but they're sad. Like in Venezuela, they're not doing great, you know. Yeah, I mean, look, it's never... I get to see...

a sort of situation where it's dramatically worked out well. And I was, you know, sometimes you listen to things that just remind you, because like a lot of people on the online right now would see me as some, a lot of them would think I'm a lefty. You know, I get more stick now off right wingers than off lefties by a massive margin because I've sort of...

To me, I'd say very still, you know, socially liberal, economically right wing. But as the culture over to Windows moved, you know, I guess I must seem like fucking Rory Stewart to these guys. I also get stick from the right though as well. To an extent, that's that thing of...

If you think of it in a human tribal sense, it's the people in your cult, the people who are closest to you are the ones who are actually at risk, a danger to you because they can convince other people to move slightly. I don't care about what Owen Jones says. He's not going to convince any of my followers anything.

but maybe Jeff Norcott might because he's also on the right but has a slight view. Yeah, there's a danger, you know, like when your own turn on you. But this is where I think like, I do think that the woke right thing does land as an idea because for me, the biggest problem I had...

with the woke thing was ideological purity. I don't have certainty about many things. So whenever someone presents an absolute point of view, I'm likely to pick holes in it and what it takes to be considered right wing. I mean, at the moment, like... if you're economically right wing, no one gives a shit. No, no one even knows. No, well, they don't, it doesn't count. No one knows my economic.

views yeah but the thing of the economic like right-wing part of me is the most extreme part of me yeah and also the thing that made me radical 10 years ago was exactly that because i wasn't standing up saying austerity was terrible i was saying yeah we need to cut down spending and stuff

like that whereas now what's deemed to be right wing is all about the cultural stuff you know whereas i you know listen man if it come down to me with tax i would i would just get rid of so many taxes i would you know 20 maximum for all I would get rid of stamp duty. You know, I would drill it right down. We just bought a new house. That's stamp duty. Why stamp duty? I mean, it literally is. It's the closest a government get to a mafia shakedown, isn't it? It's literally like some wise guys.

turn up and they go, oh yeah, you had a good bit of good fortune. We want to get our big sweat. And it's like, because a house is, people might say, well, VAT, absolutely 20% is still at emergency rate. that was set 15 years ago.

The emergency rate. Anyway, see, this is where I get angry. I didn't even know that. I'm a young businessman. I just thought it was always there. No, 20% is insanely high. It's a fifth. I didn't know that. I thought it was normal. When I charge anybody for anything, I say, oh, here's a fifth.

you know, fifth of this is going to the government. I don't know exactly what they've done to facilitate this, but, but then I get it back though. So I don't, I don't, you do a bit. Yeah. Yeah. Some of it is a bit odd, but so you can kind of make some arguments for some of that stuff where stamp duty is, it's just like.

Because it's a great life event, buying a house, right? It must be an emotional thing for you and your wife, right? Yeah, yeah. And then yet these guys come up and they go, well, you know, it's a nice house. Be ashamed if something happened to it.

Not just that, I also had Professor David Betts, who came on recently, and he thinks there's going to be a civil war in the country. And he told me that afterwards, I asked after we'd finished filming, I was like, look, this is where on the map we were buying the house. And he was like...

yeah they're going to be boarding up around the M25 and you're going to be you're going to be stuck in there yeah see that's the thing is where I'm at like all that Civil War I know Civil War dystopia stuff that's not really my kind of wheelhouse but the financial stuff yeah That is, you know. But that's boring compared to. Yeah, but look, I was poor for a bit of my life. So I can't, in a way, like that is always the big fucking priority. It's hard to.

It's hard to show that, you know, it's hard to show that in a way that people get angry together. I mean, they do still, obviously, about poverty and all of those things. It's really important. Of course it is. But immigrants, that just flashes up on the screen faster.

I'm not saying it should do, by the way. I'm not saying that's a more worthy cause than, I don't want to be misunderstood to have said that. No, but it is emotive in a way. Money's not, well, I don't know if I fully agree. I think money is emotive to me. You know, like I've been doing a thing.

on my podcast called Piss Take Prices which is just a fun throwaway thing about those things that have got so expensive it's not just you go well that's a bit steep it makes you gasp and I think that we are at that point with a lot of things in this country so I think, weirdly, I've got a weird relationship with the Conservatives. I think I am.

a conservative like you know if the on a dna sort of level just about and i know that there'll be loads of people on the right they get annoyed like why aren't you a reform guy because

you know, socially liberal, economically the right wing. There's a version of the Conservative Party which is the closest out of all the parties to what I am. Now, that doesn't mean they will always be the best spokespeople for that or that they'll be trustworthy guardians of that. But it's almost like that abusive relationship where no matter how... Often they let me down. Yeah. If they whisper sweet nothings into my ear about getting rid of tax, maybe I'll go.

All right, you said you're going to change. And I'd make that point as well, because you support a football team. Football team might get relegated. They come back up a few years later as a new manager. It's a different team now. Because people say, how can you ever trust the Tories again after those years? But it's a different bunch of people.

No, I get it. Look, you know, the immigration that happened under them after what they'd pledged. I do think, like, what's incredible about the toys is, like, you know, the ridiculous years, 900,750 or whatever. They were too high. But there was also, you know, there was Ukraine, there was Hong Kong, there was Afghanistan. Their inability to make that argument was fucking one of the most astonishing failures I've ever seen in British public life.

But yeah, like the allowance of, you know, kind of the sort of like woke elements of institutions. There was so much that happened on their watch that was supposed to be the stuff that they were the guardians against.

And maybe the biggest disappointment was after 2019 when Boris got in. I was really like, right, whatever issues I had with Boris Johnson and how trustworthy he was, I did feel that that government were going to be, they weren't going to look at social media. You know, they weren't going to look. focus groups they were just gonna get on they had an 80 seat who will ever have a bigger majority than that again yeah and um but they didn't they were just as obsessed but also you say um

You know, it's more the economic stuff that's important to you. But then I suppose, and you mentioned immigration briefly there, immigration apparently has been a net drain in our economy, right? So that's another reason that a lot of people are going, that's why we've got to go reform. Well, look, one of the compelling arguments of Brexit was, you know, tradespeople, you know, what happened to their rates of pay when there was competition from Eastern Europe, you know.

So that can, yeah, it can be a motivating factor as well. I need to piss so badly. I'm so sorry. Do you want to rush? Go and rush. Yeah, sorry. I was trying to get to the sort of end. You were talking faster the last few minutes. So basically, all of what you've just said is a way of saying women should just be in the kitchen.

I, yeah, I can't. For the record, I had a toilet break and I have no idea what we were talking about. Oh, the biological stuff. I think women should be swimming upstream, I think, or something. I think it's a really hard one because I guess we're both people, and many people watching this will also be the same, of individual liberty, men and women, my daughter, why can't she be a rocket scientist? And all of those things. And at the same time...

societal level what if by pushing and pushing and pushing that we've not only made women extremely unhappy we've also made men feel worthless and all those things that could be that could be the case i mean it's hard because like in terms of sort of measuring happiness those kind of metrics have only come in recently so we don't know what do we know about the 1950s well most of it maybe from mad men yeah but the women are all on uh sort of valium the men rule

drinking whiskey, having affairs and dying young. So I don't know if the evidence is there. Yeah, I want to be factually sure about these things, but...

I think that... I think women did self-report as happier back then than now. I think you raise really interesting points. How do you trust self-rating of happiness? Yeah, mother's ruin, all that sort of stuff with the gin. I do think that... terms of having you know a generation of young men who don't feel that they have um purpose or place or or value is such a huge problem facing us you know and that's something i've really focused on

uh recently because like if you if you're worried about the rise of the far right i am too you know because i'm center right you know i'm worried about the rise of far left too but that rarely gets i don't know how many like it's so weird with the far left is that people

Whatever you say, people always think of like fucking John Lennon and, you know, nice stuff. But it is what it is. Think of Stalin. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Right, exactly. But, you know, at the moment, maybe it's a more visible... I guess but the net result of that is if you're worried about it you have to engage with what's happening with and to young men and be sympathetic and think about how things could be better like it's no good just saying like this argument of we want

Boys have got to be better. You've got to go. Find out why they're not happy first. Because all that kind of sounds like is you see them as a utility for you. It sounds like you don't care, right? You've got to sound like you care. And that John Lewis advert, like I don't know when this will go out. I mean, it blew me away, that advert. And it just shows how things had moved culturally, where just a dad being portrayed as not a fucking bumbling idiot and whose wife knows everything.

Um, you know, the wives are always really shrewd and you know, just all the dads falling off of something in the background. Usually that's been the recent trend advert. And then a teenage boy who let's be honest in the advert looked like he could have been the older brother of the kid in adolescence.

You're like, at the beginning, you're like, where's this going? Is this a sequel? And then the fact that the kid is sensitive and nice, but what I thought I loved about it, and I do realise I'm becoming... one of these but what about the men guys but i do look out for this stuff now and and the way that they expressed how men communicate was so well observed because it's not men use way less words per day than women like statistically always always been the case you surprised me

So, hey, we've got Christmas coming up. Me and my wife, we observed last Christmas, we estimated how many words each family member used. And I think her and her mum were about 10,000. I was like the highest ranking male at about 2,000.

And then I think a lot of them are around 40 and 60. So it's a different way of communicating. But what that does sometimes to me is the way that men communicate is loaded. There are heavy metaphors. There are meanings put on things. So the exchange of a record saying, I get you, dad.

Like, even now, as I'm saying it, it chokes me up. I can see that. Well, you've got a kid as well. Yeah, I've got a son. And I just think, like, male friendships. How many films or... or things you've seen culturally about really about how male friendships work there's a film with the rocket uh called the smashing machine and at the heart of that again quietly revolutionary film is about a really positive male friendship and all but also a really toxic

relationship with a woman you know which i just haven't like don't get me wrong the main character in it isn't any angel but a woman is a fucking nightmare as well and and and to see that articulated in a film i was like wow it doesn't it's weird in a way it's just like my career you know I'm not a radical person, but there are certain cultural spaces where it doesn't take a lot to seem radical.

That adolescence then, I mean, that happened, that was like six months ago. So has the culture changed that from the adolescence? You can draw a line from adolescence to John Lewis. Well, but whoever was smart enough to realise that, however, the kind of cultural establishment...

The establishment reacted to that, you know, and we had BBC Breakfast presenters going to Kemi Bader, but you haven't seen Adolescence. That was her best moment, by the way, was to just go, yeah, yeah, no, I haven't. Because you know what? At that point, neither had the vast majority of the British public and still haven't.

Something doing 8 million is amazing numbers for Netflix. It still means the vast majority of people hadn't seen a thing. And it was still, I watched it as a TV show. I thought it was a great drama. Yeah. But I saw immediately that it was a drama. You know, if you look statistically.

I'm not saying that people that come from loving nuclear families don't produce toxic boys that commit crimes, but statistically, you know, he's got this hardworking dad, you know, like he didn't look at him at football, you know, it's a drama. right it is a drama how that it developed with starmer who just kept referring to it as a documentary right make that mistake once mate you make it a second time it's starting to look like an agenda and then are we going to show it in schools

And that's the starting point is you're going like, is that how you're starting a conversation with boys? It's like, don't you dare end up with this extreme, extreme example of a horrific human being. That can't be the start of this debate. It's got to like, what's going on? What's wrong? How do you feel?

It was well shot and well acted, wasn't it? I thought so. But a lot of people even hate it as a drama. But like, again, this is the problem you get into with the right, where this is not a great time for nuance. So if you just say like, I liked it as a drama, but I don't like the way it's been extrapolated.

to reflect real life. People go, who's your fucking shit drama? You're getting paid to say that by, or you're trying to get your own Netflix show. I'm going, look, I am sadly so far from getting a Netflix show. It's not even funny. That will, hopefully after this goes, we'll get some Netflix. Yeah, it's in the back.

That first episode, I got a bit bored as it went on and I did feel a bit morally lectured at as well. But the first episode was phenomenal. Like the way they, the pacing and all of that. Yes. And the lack of sort of clarity about what, who it would be. You know, I was genuinely.

on the edge of my seat. But the fact that there are people in our political and cultural class that can't see the difference between a TV show. I do think there was something that happened, I guess, with teenage boys where... It's just the way people just say Andrew Tate. I guarantee that young people right now, if you and I know who Andrew Tate is, they're not watching Andrew Tate. They're not even watching the second generation of Andrew Tate. They all know who he is.

But the male influencers now would have split off into many, many different things. We won't fucking know because we're old. So when you're just sitting there, every time something bad happens going, so... the Andrew Tates to this world. You just sound like an old fart. Like it must've been the same during the punk era, you know? So it's all about, if you say we need a discussion with boys, I 100% agree. But how you start that discussion and you're...

self-evident motivations. If it seems like you just want to get something out of it, why would they listen to you? I get wound up as well by what you were talking before about a lot of female teachers. And so we deal with men or boys in a female way. Even when we're talking about sort of men being able to express themselves, you said they do it in a different way to women.

grunts and metaphors and no one says what they're feeling um but whenever i've seen that expressed on tv often by women it's kind of the loose women kind of vibe that kind of show it's like we need men to cry more And I think some men do cry, and I cry if I watch a movie, but I don't need to cry. I don't think I need to. No, I'm a big crier, by the way. That is just the thing I've come to in like middle age. It happens as you get older as well. It's pathetic. Truly pathetic.

as i'm crying i'm looking at myself going loser you know yeah because i am that kind of bloke but the i do think that this thing of saying if you're saying men need to be empathetic they need to cry more they need to listen more you're sort of just listing what you're sort of saying is men need to be more like women right

are stereotypically female things. That's quite prescriptive. That's not an answer. And also you get this other thing in the kind of sort of liberal space where they'll say like, a real man would cry. And you go, you would never say a real woman anything. Would you? You wouldn't go, oh, a real woman would be competitive in the boardroom. A real woman would negotiate for a higher salary. People wouldn't dare say this shit. So there are a number of double standards in... Look, I'm...

i'm nearly 50 right when you talk about male privilege i can I probably, I can think of examples of where I would have benefited from. When I was younger, there were some jobs I went for. I was not the best candidate and I got the job. You know, I can think of situations where I've been privileged in some ways, not exclusively. And I think for any person who's working class, it's a different question yet again.

But the people have been very slow to catch on of what that means to a person who is young and male today, you know, because they're growing up at a time when, you know, young women are out-earning and out-learning men, you know, to quite an advanced age now. Universities dominated by women.

It's taken, I think, too long to change the discussion. It is changing, but I think that a lot of time's been lost. It's positive, though. It's positive to see. It's moving in a positive way. Absolutely. You're right about that John Lewis advert. Only when the way you said it was really interesting because I hadn't even thought about it that I don't remember ever seeing a guy not...

presented as the bumbling fool. And they keep telling us, everyone keeps telling us, like, you need to see yourself represented on the TV or whatever. Can't be what I can't see. Well, when it comes to adverts, and it's funny because then when it comes to adverts, people, well, then they'll dismiss it and go, well...

Well, you're just being hypersensitive or you're being woke now. But you've drilled in the message of representation. I'm sort of saying, yeah. Either we do it or we don't. Yeah, exactly. Either it all matters or none of it matters. Man, it's weird to think, what did that do, I suppose? I'm 36. So that all started happening. by the time I was 10, 15 years old and anyone else my age. We've now had our entire adult lives. We've only ever seen ourselves represented on screen as bumbling idiots.

stupid well it's just overcorrection that's the sad thing about you know society it's like the girl boss phenomenon in films rather than slowly evolving and saying yes we do have a lack of female central characters and heroes but how can we do this in a way A, women want to watch because there's no evidence that the girl boss type characters actually attracted female audience. You know, biggest film for women was Barbie, right? And so...

It just, it's just, that's what I always find disappointing about both humans and culture and politics is the wild over correction. So I've no doubt now, now we've got the John Lewis advert, you know, there'll be other adverts. It just blows.

and i'm here for that yeah yeah yeah you know just just blokes just being like rounded human beings and stuff like that um But yeah, yeah, no, I think it was a, I think it was a sort of watershed moment, but it was also, it was also, you know what the stupid thing was, it was just common sense, is that...

Most people aren't in this space of discourse, you know, just thinking negatively about men day in, day out. And for a lot of people, you know, wives of husbands, mothers of sons, they'll go, oh, well, that was lovely. they won't sit there and think oh but what about us or what about the fact that the woman in it was just doing some tidying up or as some people have pointed out yeah

You know, they'll just think it's a lovely image and a lovely sentiment. And it was. It was a lovely sentiment. Well, a lot of people hate it. And the one criticism I think really lands is that it's not very Christmassy. And that is 100% true. It's not. Yeah, and I suppose, I mean, for me, I don't have a son. I mean, I can empathize. I'm not on a kind of spectrum. You can imagine. I can imagine what it might be like to have a son.

Yeah. Well, no, it's funny. Those are people with lived experience, you know, like as though we can't speculate outside, a little bit outside the realm of our direct identity. It was mad. I remember Barack Obama.

It's funny with the left because they loved him for a while. And he actually started making kind of anti-woke noises quite a while ago. And he said, well, we can't have a situation where people say, well, you can't talk on that because you're not directly from that community. And then they decided, oh, he's a prick. Can you do it? Because when you did your star mode, it was actually better than... Because are you able to shut off your nose when you speak? It's kind of just...

Yeah. It's almost like when I started learning, it was just doing that. As you learn them. Some of the words... Dr. Evil. Barely get out of his mouth. One million pound. One is Dr. Evoy, not Austin Powers. There's that way that he talks when he's not fluent. He's not a fluent communicator. And I know it's an easy target comedically, but it's funny. Well, you should be. I mean, Barack Obama is an amazing orator.

yeah tremendous I mean could sell ideas to me that I don't like yeah And, you know, and Farage, this is where, like, it's so funny with all these figures you get now, whether it's Musk, Trump or Farage, is like, they inspire such either devoted followings or fanatical critics.

that people can't admit that they're a mixed bag of things. Like, you can say that's good, that's bad. And Farage, it's a rhythm thing. I mean, it's like what stand-ups all strive for is there's a way, you know, that Nigel talks about, where every third or fourth word...

We'll have an emphasis. And it keeps you involved. And if you look- Obama did that as well. Can you do Obama? I can't. Yeah. All I remember is a change. It was on the way. That was it. But I'm only doing an impression of another guy doing it. But, but like-

The first rule of politics, communication. If you can't sell an idea, you're nowhere, like you're dead in the water. So it doesn't matter what all the policy or all the well-meaning, maybe Keir Starmer is a great bloke that really wants great things. If you can't engage people, that's like the door.

step moment for for politicians so it's not just frivolous to point out he's got a stupid voice yeah it's like uh i mean the problem is if you have a stupid voice okay right gordon brown wasn't the best communicator you know But if you also then don't have a coherent policy position and then you also keep you turning on stuff and then you say, oh, I'm in the strangers one week and fuck the racists the next week, you know, it just, he's ended up in a space of standing for almost nothing.

and that's kistama You will be standing for something in your tour. That's a segue. And your podcast also stands for things. Tell me a little bit about where people can go and get those kinds of things. So, yeah, the tour, Basic Bloke 2, There's No Bloke Without Fire, which no one likes as a title, by the way.

I thought it'd be funny to just do a sequel, but that was just me on that one. But don't be put off by the title, right? As sequels go. It's a good title. What's that? It's a good title. Well, in conversation it is. Whenever I say it to the audiences, they go, hmm.

A lot of the audience think I should have gone with Blowback Mountain, which I think is... Blowback Mountain. It sounds more like a gag. Or maybe just come up with a new name, I suppose. But the point is, the show is... And I know comedians always say this, but it's the best I've done. Like, I think that... or maybe i've got like my desire or the riskers come back to my comedy a little bit more

I'm definitely willing to take a few more risks on this tour. Last one, I loved doing the last one, but it was very mainstream-y. This has definitely got a bit more bite to it. So people are going Live Nation. And because I'm so desperate to get to every part of the UK, it's geographic. impossible that I'm not within 15 miles of you so if you live in a town in the UK predominantly in England but also Belfast just get on Live Nation and then the podcast what most people think is

It started off as an interview type thing, but I'm not like you, you can listen. I can't, I love talking. So I get me and usually another comic. We just make jokes about the news in the old. fashion way you know before the topical shows just disappeared and i do that usually twice weekly and it's called what most people think actually because the producer of the mash report uh said to me once he said he said the great thing about you jeff is you communicate by the means of what most people think

And I still don't know if he was taking a piss. I think it might be a backhanded compliment. Well, I don't know. But it sounded like revolutionary. I was going, yeah. I mean, it was like once I had a meeting with a TV production company. And this was after Brexit. And they said, you know, we want to... talk about we want to talk more to you know um people with alternative opinions i went by alternative do you mean the majority because in their mind they were

Fair play to them. They had me in for a chat, but I was still like this niche thing. But yeah, the podcast, I love doing the podcast and I love it. Just like the stand up and the podcast. I love it because it's unfiltered. I decide what's in it.

You know what I mean? It's not subject to an edit or a legal team or any of that stuff. So that's probably, if people were just going to consume anything, I'd do either of those things. Well, it's a great podcast and you're amazing on stage. I love that guy. I love that backhanded compliment you got. I think he was just, you know, all those, you speak to the cavemen, don't you? You speak to all those cavemen, you know?

Well, I mean, in fairness to him, he was like, we used to clash over things, but the fact remains is that he had a topical show and he created a space for someone even at all right of centre, which maybe there should be more of it, but... You know, even to this day, that hasn't really happened anywhere else. So, you know, I mean, it was great fun doing the match report, especially because there would be a lot of, you know, the jokes would come from one direction and then I would come on.

And it was so easy to see Medjiggy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, and then the audience were fair play to them. They were like a BBC type audience, but I always got a great reaction. And just sorry, I realised we were trying to wrap up here, but when I did the first episode of that, what was interesting was we did a run through together and...

I don't think they were trying to be mean, but none of the cast laughed at my bit. It just wasn't their thing. And I was really worried. I'd be shitting myself. I was shitting myself. I was three days in the bad place. And then we did the... on camera rehearsal on the day of the first record and the cameramen were all laughing at what I said. And I thought, I think I'm going to be all right because the cameramen are like, well, they're just normal blokes, right? Yeah. What most people think.

Not the elite, not the liberal elite. I don't know what the cliches are now. I think they changed. The original was avocado munching. I always thought that was weird because you don't really munch an avocado. People who think... Yeah, that's true. It sort of almost slips down your throat. Why karate? That was Ursula Braverman. She did like a whole list. Yes. But the truth is, I genuinely do hate avocados. So that is not an affection.

I love an avocado. It's disgusting. No, they're great. They're great. How can something that's like not meat be that greasy? That's what I like about it. They ruin rainforests or something, don't they? They're really bad. I think you're not supposed to eat them. I like the fact that actually, for liberal people, their addiction actually throws into focus their own paradox morally. Yeah. Yes, well, exactly.

Now, loads of cafes, we don't serve avocados because of what they do to the world or something like that. You serve a chia seed. Yeah. The only time I told a... because just that fear that you have from the comedy you know are they going to be okay was I was doing this gig I was doing a theatre show with Richard Dawkins in Belfast and I was nervous anyway because he's Dawkins and what are you talking about I don't know about all the science and all that stuff and beforehand

Someone tweeted, I'm in a big crowd tonight and all this stuff. And someone said, ask him about his favorite horoscope. So I knew that then, I couldn't then not make that my first question. What's your horoscope? It's funny. Yeah, you can't not then, but it meant that for an hour, I was suffering. Yeah, horrible, horrible. And then I went on stage and it was very echoey.

as well did you say it weirdly as well I said yeah I mean you have to like the conviction matters because like comedy is so delicate what's your favourite horoscope like if it went up halfway through well it was so echoey anyway and he was the whole time going

He couldn't quite hear because it was very echoey. Oh, and if someone asks you to repeat something that's supposed to be funny. He just went, it took a good few seconds, which were the longest seconds of my life. And it was one of those where the audience need the permission of him to laugh.

before they laugh and eventually he did go I'm not answering that and then everyone laughed and it was okay but that gave me a little insight into your world and I go I respect it your personality just falls away from the inside Who's a heretic you admire? A heretic I admire? I don't know. I don't give it much thought. I mean, it's funny at the moment, like Bill Burr is under revision by everybody. Yeah.

I always kind of thought that he's just always never wanted the easy laugh. So I think he, back once upon a time, he was going at the bankers. So that was quite lefty. And then he moved like maybe more Republican friendly. And then recently he said stuff that people said awoke. I just think his main guiding principle, now the Saudi thing is another thing entirely.

But I always think he's sort of been guided by he doesn't want to get the easy laugh. I do get that. And I was going to say before you said the Saudi. But the problem for him now is now he's pissed off the white lot with the Saudi thing. Pissed off everyone. Well, yeah, that's the problem. Yeah. I just thought that that's, that's one thing I suppose I've always thought is, is like there's some.

It's quite, you want a tricky par five when it comes to comedy. You want to kind of slightly, I'm not an edgelord, but it's nice to feel like you're taking risks. And certainly on this show, like I'm back in, you know, full risk taking mode. Yeah. Louis C.K. used to be really good with that, taking those risks. Yeah, well, the thing about American comics is that just, we can't do it in this country.

Like, it's just British comics. There's natural self-deprecation. We have to caveat everything. Me included. We do the fucking terms and conditions. You go, and I think this, and not everybody, and of course, I'm not saying this, and I'm not saying that. Whereas Americans just go, so why the fuck are women?

always yapping their fucking mouths. That's good Bill Burr. Well, I mean, I've listened to him long enough, but like the, you just sort of think like we don't have, I try to have a bit of swagger, but I do think America really invented standup. So, you know, they've always, whether it's Dave Chappelle.

or whether it's, you know, Bill Burr or, you know, people like that. There's just a degree of confidence that I don't think. Robin Williams back in the day. Yeah, you know, Eddie Murphy. I mean, Eddie Murphy was the first for me, like, that just, you just thought, God, how do you do, well, you know, like.

Doing voices. Yeah. Just all the fun stuff. Louis Seiko, I remember just a few years ago, he came out and he said, he made this joke about pedophiles. And he just said, he said like, it's, you know, the worst thing ever. You go to prison and all these things. Yeah. So it must be.

It must be really good. That's an example of that thing. I don't know whether that was pre... I'm not saying that what he was accused of was in any way related to paedophilia. But unfortunately for him, when routines like that... I see, yeah. Resurface, you know. But the, yeah, that's it. Like, that's the hardest idea, really. Do you think a Brit would avoid that joke? Who's that? Would a Brit in Britain avoid that kind of joke? Yeah, no, no, not necessarily, but it would be...

Like I say, the terms and conditions, the sort of Hugh Grant, like, you know, I wouldn't, I'm certainly, this is not, I wouldn't say this is an endorsement on any level and far be it from me to say, you know, it's like that. That's the thing. I just wish, I wish I had that bravado, you know? Got to be more American about things. Well, on this tour...

Yeah, you will be. I am. You are. I am, yes. We'll put links down below to that. And yeah, people, please, please, Jeff Norcott is one of the best out there. All I hear about is how good he is as well. Everyone who's going to his shows at the moment, whenever I watch him, I'm cracking up. I was cracking up the whole. time just now so please go to his tour we'll have a link down there

Listen to his podcast. It's one of the best out there as well. He's been wonderful. So please put lovely comments and things because there'll be angry ones anyway, won't there? So can we fill that with some of the nice ones? I know a lot of people are going like, oh, I don't usually comment, but put some nice comments in there. Hit the like. and keep watching this channel yeah so my bbc person was everything i said they were right