Tim Dillon: Comedy, Power, Conspiracy Theories, and Freedom

Lex Fridman (01:19.960)

Some of these conversations will be a bit of a gamble

Tim Dillon (01:23.600)

in that I have no idea how they will turn out.

Lex Fridman (01:26.520)

But I'm willing to risk it for a chance

Tim Dillon (01:29.440)

at a bit of an adventure.

Lex Fridman (01:31.080)

And I'm happy and honored that Tim, this time,

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wanted to take a chance as well.

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If you enjoy this thing, subscribe on YouTube,

Tim Dillon (01:39.200)

review it on Apple Podcast, follow on Spotify,

Lex Fridman (01:42.160)

support it on Patreon, or connect with me

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on Twitter at Lex Friedman.

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And now, here's my conversation with Tim Dillon.

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What would you like your tombstone to read?

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It's a good way to summarize the essence of a human being.

Tim Dillon (01:58.840)

I would like it to say, this has not been paid for.

Lex Fridman (02:01.520)

Yeah.

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And I want my living relatives to struggle to pay for it.

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And I think I would like them to be hounded every day.

Tim Dillon (02:11.320)

I would like people to call and go, listen,

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we don't wanna ever excavate a body,

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but we will because this has not been paid for.

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I love the idea of leaving the, like debt,

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leaving the world in lots of debt

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that other people have to deal with.

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And I know people that have done that.

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I know people that have been in families

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where that's happened, where someone has to sit

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and just curse the sky

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because they don't have a physical person anymore

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to be angry at, but they still have to deal

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with the decisions that person made.

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And that's deeply tragic,

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but that's always struck me as very funny.

Lex Fridman (02:47.040)

Well, it's a kind of immortality, the debt.

Tim Dillon (02:49.400)

Because if the debt lasts for a long time,

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the anger lasts for a long time.

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And then you're now immortal in the minds of many.

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You arouse emotion in the minds of many.

Tim Dillon (02:59.360)

My mother's best friend in the town I grew up in,

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her husband shot himself in the driveway.

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And my mother's friend never got a chance to just grieve

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because he owed so much money.

Tim Dillon (03:12.600)

She would come over and go, I hate him.

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I fucking hate him.

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And it was just such an interesting thing

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to see somebody who, and her kids ended up getting angry

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at her for that because they didn't understand

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why she would hate a guy who was clearly suffering.

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But she goes, he took the selfish way out.

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He fucked us.

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And it was always interesting for me to just remember

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that you can leave earth and still be a problem.

Tim Dillon (03:39.360)

That's kind of a special person.

Lex Fridman (03:43.360)

So that's, I think, what I'd like my tombstone to read.

Tim Dillon (03:45.520)

Yeah, there's a show called Louis with Louis C.K.

Lex Fridman (03:48.520)

I don't know if you watched it.

Tim Dillon (03:49.520)

I'm aware of it.

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There's this moment, I think, where an old guy's talking

Tim Dillon (03:53.480)

to Louis about the best part about love

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is after you break up.

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And it's remembering the good times and feeling that loss,

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the pain of that loss.

Tim Dillon (04:07.160)

The worst part about love is when you no longer

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feel that pain.

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So the pain of losing somebody lasts longer,

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is more intense and lasts longer than the actual love.

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So his argument was like the pain is what love really is.

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Wow.

Tim Dillon (04:24.320)

In the same way that anger,

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your tombstone would arouse will last longer.

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And that's deeply like a human thing.

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Like why do we attach happiness

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to the way we should remember others?

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It could be just anger.

Tim Dillon (04:40.560)

I know so many people who will have

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deeply complicated feelings when...

Tim Dillon (04:45.840)

I did drugs for many years and I spent time

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with some wild people.

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And their parents were also wild people.

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And some of their parents have done crazy things to them.

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And have created situations that were not productive

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for child rearing.

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And so I know that when those people die,

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it's going to be a very mixed bag.

Tim Dillon (05:11.520)

Like there's going to be a lot of complex emotions.

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Like, hey, we loved that guy.

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But also when we look back, he was a horrible father,

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a horrible husband, but he was fun.

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And we don't put enough stock in that,

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but that will be a push and pull.

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And I'll be the one kind of bringing up like,

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hey, he was a lot of fun.

Tim Dillon (05:33.120)

He was a lot.

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Remember when he stuck us,

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one of the things this particular person I'm talking about,

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we were at a bar and me and my friend were there,

Tim Dillon (05:41.720)

we're having dinner.

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And his father, who was an alcoholic,

Tim Dillon (05:45.600)

a guy that would go out every night and didn't work,

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refused to work, would lie and say he was going to work

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and then go to a bar.

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I mean, just a fun person.

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And we were sitting at this bar restaurant

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and the bartender, we see his father walk up

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to the bartender and say, point at us, point at our table

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and go and put the thumbs up.

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And the bartender nodded.

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And then the father walked over to our table and he said,

Tim Dillon (06:10.840)

listen, I just want to let you know I just bought you dinner.

Lex Fridman (06:14.720)

And I looked at his son and I said, he's a pretty good guy.

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And then he climbed over the little fence down to the water

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and got in his little boat.

Tim Dillon (06:21.200)

It was a little cigarette boat and he just drove away.

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And then about an hour later, we went and we said,

Tim Dillon (06:26.400)

I think that guy took care of the bill.

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But she said, well, go talk to the bartender.

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So we talked to the bartender and he goes,

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he handed us a bill and the bill was for like $1,000.

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And we said, wait a minute, what the hell's going on?

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And he goes, the guy that left an hour ago said,

Tim Dillon (06:40.680)

you were going to take care of his bill.

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He's been drinking here all week.

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And we go, what are you talking about?

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And he goes, remember, he pointed at you.

Tim Dillon (06:47.840)

He put the thumbs up and you guys waved.

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You remember that?

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And the guy go, and we went, yeah.

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And I just looked at my friends, my friend and I went,

Tim Dillon (06:55.680)

you know, your dad is just,

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we're going to remember him for all kinds of reasons.

Lex Fridman (07:00.040)

But to you, he was fun.

Lex Fridman (07:01.480)

He was a lot of fun.

Tim Dillon (07:02.320)

He wasn't my dad, but I spent a lot of time with him.

Lex Fridman (07:04.480)

I was in two boating accidents with him.

Tim Dillon (07:07.560)

You know, two boating accidents.

Lex Fridman (07:08.880)

Alcohol involved, drugs involved.

Tim Dillon (07:10.080)

Yes, he was, usually alcohol was involved

Lex Fridman (07:11.880)

when he left his house and when he was at home as well.

Lex Fridman (07:15.840)

But I was in two boating accidents.

Lex Fridman (07:17.240)

And do you know how fun someone has to be

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to get in a second boating accident?

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Do you know what a good time someone has to be

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to get in a boat with them

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after you've already gotten in one wreck?

Tim Dillon (07:30.680)

Never get fooled again.

Lex Fridman (07:31.680)

What was that line?

Tim Dillon (07:32.520)

George Bush, never get fooled again.

Lex Fridman (07:34.400)

Right.

Tim Dillon (07:35.360)

Yeah, so if you're getting fooled again,

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you know, there's a reason for it,

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but he was a fun guy.

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He did have a death wish.

Tim Dillon (07:40.520)

The second boating accident, he grabbed me

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and said, you can't hang out with me anymore.

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And I said, why?

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He goes, I'm trying to kill myself.

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And I was like, oh.

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And then I understood that like all of the fun

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under the fun lived a very destructive person

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who not only was destructive, but wanted to die.

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So speaking of fun people that want to die,

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I don't know if you're, we can go Hunter S. Thompson,

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but Charles Bukowski.

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I don't know if you're aware of the guy.

Tim Dillon (08:06.400)

I'm aware of him, sure.

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I've read some of his stuff.

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So his tombstone says,

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I just want to ask you a question about it.

Tim Dillon (08:12.480)

His tombstone says, don't try.

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Interesting.

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What do you think about that advice

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as a way to approach life?

Tim Dillon (08:19.960)

I think for many people, it's a good advice

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because the people that are going to try will do anyway.

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And the people that need to be told,

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there's a whole cottage industry now

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of motivational speakers and life coaches and gurus

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that tell people that they all have to own their own business

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and be their own boss and be a disruptor

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and get into industries.

Tim Dillon (08:45.160)

That's incredibly unrealistic for most people.

Lex Fridman (08:47.440)

Most people are not suited for that.

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And the Gary Vees of the world that tell everybody

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that they should just hustle and grind

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and hustle and grind.

Lex Fridman (08:54.940)

They're very light on the specifics

Tim Dillon (08:56.060)

of what they should actually do.

Lex Fridman (08:58.120)

Yeah, I think a lot of people,

Tim Dillon (08:59.720)

that's not horrible advice to give to a lot of people.

Lex Fridman (09:02.080)

I think my generation got horrible advice

Tim Dillon (09:05.160)

from our parents, from our teachers.

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And that advice was follow your dreams and nobody,

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and that was it, by the way.

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There was no like, what are your dreams?

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Are they realistic?

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What happens when they don't work out?

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Will your dreams make you happy?

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Are your dreams real?

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Do they exist on earth?

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Can you follow, anybody follow your dreams?

Tim Dillon (09:25.680)

You can be anything you want to be.

Lex Fridman (09:26.800)

Horrible advice, horrible advice.

Tim Dillon (09:29.080)

Worst advice you could ever give a generation of people.

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Really, truly.

Tim Dillon (09:32.760)

I mean, think about it.

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If you were talking to somebody

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and you were trying to make them succeed,

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are there any two worse pieces of advice to give them

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than follow your dreams

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and you can be anything you want to be?

Tim Dillon (09:48.640)

Those to me are the two most destructive pieces

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of information I've ever heard.

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So let me push back because.

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Okay, that's fair.

Tim Dillon (09:55.640)

This is. Many people do.

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So yeah, this is like a rigorous journalistic interview.

Tim Dillon (10:01.840)

Larry King, by the way, passed away today.

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So I'm taking over the.

Tim Dillon (10:05.600)

It's very sad.

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I'm carrying the.

Tim Dillon (10:07.260)

It's very sad.

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RIP King.

Lex Fridman (10:09.680)

Yeah, what was I even gonna say?

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Oh, let me push back on the follow your dream thing

Tim Dillon (10:14.640)

is I come from an immigrant family

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where I was always working extremely hard at stuff,

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like in a stupid way.

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I would, I love, there's something about me

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that loves hitting my head against the wall

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over and over and over until either my head breaks

Tim Dillon (10:31.440)

or the wall breaks.

Lex Fridman (10:32.360)

Just like, I love that dedication

Tim Dillon (10:34.680)

for no purpose whatsoever.

Lex Fridman (10:36.200)

It's like the mouse that's stuck in a cage or whatever.

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And no, and everybody always told me,

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my family, the people around me,

Tim Dillon (10:45.020)

the sort of the epitome of what I could achieve

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is to be kind of a stable job.

Tim Dillon (10:52.000)

You know, the old like lawyer doctor,

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in my case, it's like scientists and so on.

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But I had these dreams at this fire, you know,

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about love robots.

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And that nobody ever gave me permission

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to pursue those dreams.

Tim Dillon (11:08.360)

I know you're supposed to grab it yourself.

Lex Fridman (11:10.240)

Nobody's supposed to give you permission,

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but there's something about just people saying, you know,

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fuck what everyone else thinks,

Tim Dillon (11:18.720)

like giving you permission, a parent

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or somebody like that saying, do your own thing.

Tim Dillon (11:23.480)

Go become an actor, go become like,

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do the crazy thing you're not supposed to do,

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an artist, go build a company, quit school,

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all that kind of stuff.

Tim Dillon (11:31.960)

Yes, sure.

Lex Fridman (11:33.200)

That's the push back against the,

Tim Dillon (11:36.040)

follow your dreams as bad advice.

Lex Fridman (11:38.640)

In mass, if you were to look at,

Tim Dillon (11:40.540)

in mass, if you were to look at statistically

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how few people that works out for,

Tim Dillon (11:45.360)

I'm just, no, but let's be very honest.

Lex Fridman (11:46.920)

That's very true.

Tim Dillon (11:47.760)

Be very honest.

Lex Fridman (11:48.580)

So I mean like, yeah, if you're gonna go be an,

Tim Dillon (11:50.520)

hey, I was broke for 10 years before I became a,

Lex Fridman (11:52.920)

before I was making money as a comedian.

Tim Dillon (11:54.600)

I get it.

Lex Fridman (11:55.840)

I didn't need Gary Vaynerchuk

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to tell me to follow my thing, right?

Lex Fridman (11:59.720)

And here's the other thing.

Tim Dillon (12:00.560)

I was kind of funny and like,

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I was kind of, a lot of things were in my favor

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of being a comedian, right?

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I had this kind of crazy fucked up life.

Tim Dillon (12:09.080)

I had a lot of stories.

Lex Fridman (12:10.500)

I had exhausted, I was willing to fail.

Tim Dillon (12:12.920)

I had failed before.

Lex Fridman (12:14.680)

I was broke.

Tim Dillon (12:15.540)

I didn't care about being broke.

Lex Fridman (12:16.960)

I knew how to be broke.

Tim Dillon (12:18.700)

I had, I was shameless to a degree.

Lex Fridman (12:21.360)

I was, I would get on a stage night after night

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and be laughed at.

Lex Fridman (12:24.880)

I would, I had a high threshold for being embarrassed.

Tim Dillon (12:28.040)

I had a high threshold for people thinking

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that I was a scumbag, right?

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And showing up at family parties and being like,

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yeah, I still really don't have a job.

Lex Fridman (12:35.320)

And I'm just, I work at comedy clubs kind of,

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and I get booked when I can.

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And I was, you know, suited for it.

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There's this idea that people can just roam

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around the world injecting themselves into other things

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they have no aptitude for at all.

Lex Fridman (12:56.400)

And will that to happen?

Lex Fridman (12:58.240)

A small percentage of people might be able to do that,

Lex Fridman (13:01.080)

but the vast majority of people have something

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they might key into that they're meant to do.

Tim Dillon (13:06.760)

Like you loved robots, you love technology,

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and you found a place in that world where you thrive.

Lex Fridman (13:12.800)

But I think many people, a lot of people love robots, right?

Lex Fridman (13:16.140)

So a lot of people think everything you do is interesting.

Tim Dillon (13:18.440)

I think your shit is fascinating.

Lex Fridman (13:20.160)

I watch you or podcasts, and I think it's very interesting.

Tim Dillon (13:23.600)

I have no place in your world.

Lex Fridman (13:26.240)

You know what I mean?

Tim Dillon (13:27.320)

I have no place in that world.

Lex Fridman (13:29.000)

I don't like remedial math.

Tim Dillon (13:32.960)

I don't like community college math.

Lex Fridman (13:35.400)

I think it's a waste of my time.

Lex Fridman (13:37.280)

What do you think about robot?

Lex Fridman (13:38.280)

Would you ever buy a robot for your home?

Tim Dillon (13:40.560)

Yes.

Lex Fridman (13:41.700)

What will it do?

Tim Dillon (13:43.140)

I'd be a companion, a friend.

Lex Fridman (13:44.880)

Oh yeah, I mean, I would like to start replacing friends

Lex Fridman (13:47.040)

and family with robots immediately.

Lex Fridman (13:49.040)

I mean, truly, truly.

Tim Dillon (13:51.280)

I mean, I'm not even kidding.

Lex Fridman (13:52.620)

Like I would like to have a Thanksgiving with four robots.

Tim Dillon (13:57.000)

I'm dead serious.

Lex Fridman (13:58.920)

Are they into QAnon?

Lex Fridman (14:00.040)

Like are the robots, when do the robots start going crazy?

Lex Fridman (14:05.720)

That's my question is like, how long do the robots

Tim Dillon (14:08.160)

live with me before they are also a problem

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and I got to replace them?

Lex Fridman (14:12.520)

You know what I mean?

Lex Fridman (14:13.480)

You're gonna indoctrinate the robot.

Tim Dillon (14:15.440)

The robot's gonna call me like my aunt does

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and talk about coronavirus for an hour every morning

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and tell me everyone in America who's died of coronavirus.

Lex Fridman (14:22.940)

One of the things I enjoy in life

Tim Dillon (14:25.760)

is how terrified people like you,

Lex Fridman (14:29.200)

I'm a huge fan by the way, get a robot.

Tim Dillon (14:32.360)

Well, I'm concerned about AI

Lex Fridman (14:36.400)

completely getting rid of the need for human beings

Tim Dillon (14:39.640)

because human beings, I mean, usually you go out

Lex Fridman (14:41.840)

in the street and you go,

Lex Fridman (14:43.480)

so few of these people are necessary, even now.

Lex Fridman (14:46.880)

Even now you look at people and you go,

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they're hanging on by a thread, right?

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And you can just imagine how many jobs

Tim Dillon (14:52.840)

are gonna get replaced, how many industries

Lex Fridman (14:55.360)

are going to be completely remade with AI

Lex Fridman (14:58.640)

and the pace of change worries me a little bit

Lex Fridman (15:01.720)

because we do a very bad job in this country

Tim Dillon (15:04.320)

of mitigation when we have problems.

Lex Fridman (15:07.520)

We don't do a great job.

Lex Fridman (15:08.600)

We did not great job with COVID, right?

Lex Fridman (15:11.160)

We don't do a good job.

Tim Dillon (15:12.000)

It's just something we don't do well.

Lex Fridman (15:13.920)

We're good in booms and busts.

Tim Dillon (15:15.800)

We're good when it's good.

Lex Fridman (15:17.080)

And we're actually, we kind of know how to kind of like,

Tim Dillon (15:19.240)

hey, we're bottomed out.

Lex Fridman (15:20.580)

We're like a gambling addict in this country.

Tim Dillon (15:22.800)

We like, we know what it feels like

Lex Fridman (15:24.800)

to be outside of an OTB at 9 a.m.

Tim Dillon (15:26.680)

drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes going,

Lex Fridman (15:28.440)

I'm gonna build it back.

Lex Fridman (15:29.800)

And we know what it's like to win,

Lex Fridman (15:31.560)

but anything in between, it seems not that great.

Lex Fridman (15:35.660)

So to me, it feels like are we gonna be able

Lex Fridman (15:38.200)

to like help people that are displaced

Lex Fridman (15:41.680)

and that have their jobs taken by,

Lex Fridman (15:43.720)

I mean, do you not fear sort of a world

Tim Dillon (15:47.160)

where you have a lot of artificial intelligence

Lex Fridman (15:50.800)

replacing workers and then what happens?

Tim Dillon (15:53.280)

There's a lot of fears around artificial intelligence.

Lex Fridman (15:56.040)

One of them is, yes, displacement of jobs, workers.

Tim Dillon (15:59.440)

That's technology in general.

Lex Fridman (16:01.280)

That's just any kind of new innovations displace jobs.

Tim Dillon (16:06.280)

I'm less worried about that.

Lex Fridman (16:09.360)

I'm more worried about other impacts

Tim Dillon (16:10.840)

of artificial intelligence.

Lex Fridman (16:11.840)

For example, the nature of our discourse,

Tim Dillon (16:13.720)

like social, the effects of algorithms

Lex Fridman (16:15.880)

on the way we communicate with each other,

Tim Dillon (16:17.840)

the spread of information,

Lex Fridman (16:19.680)

what that information looks like,

Tim Dillon (16:21.280)

the creation of silos, all that kind of stuff.

Lex Fridman (16:23.960)

I think that would just make worse

Tim Dillon (16:27.520)

the effects that the displacement of jobs has.

Lex Fridman (16:32.040)

I think ultimately, I have a hope

Tim Dillon (16:34.640)

that technology creates more opportunities

Lex Fridman (16:36.720)

than it destroys.

Tim Dillon (16:37.760)

I hope so too.

Lex Fridman (16:38.880)

So in that sense, AI to me is an exciting possibility,

Lex Fridman (16:44.360)

but the challenges this world presents

Lex Fridman (16:48.880)

will create divisions, will create chaos and so on.

Lex Fridman (16:52.000)

So I'm more focused on the way we deal

Lex Fridman (16:55.120)

as a society with that chaos,

Tim Dillon (16:56.680)

the way we talk to each other.

Lex Fridman (16:57.960)

That's huge.

Tim Dillon (16:58.800)

Creating the platform that's healthy for that.

Lex Fridman (17:00.680)

Now, as a comedian creator,

Tim Dillon (17:03.480)

whatever you want to call it,

Lex Fridman (17:04.680)

people that put out content,

Lex Fridman (17:07.760)

the gatekeepers are now algorithmic, right?

Lex Fridman (17:10.280)

So they are kind of almost AI ready.

Lex Fridman (17:12.360)

So if you are a person that puts out YouTube videos,

Lex Fridman (17:16.680)

podcasts, whatever you're doing,

Tim Dillon (17:20.560)

it used to be a guy in the back of the room with a cigar

Lex Fridman (17:24.360)

saying, I like you or get him out of here.

Tim Dillon (17:27.400)

Now, it's an algorithm you barely understand.

Lex Fridman (17:30.640)

I've talked to people at YouTube,

Lex Fridman (17:32.160)

but I don't know if they understand the algorithm.

Lex Fridman (17:34.840)

They don't.

Tim Dillon (17:35.680)

They don't.

Lex Fridman (17:36.520)

This is fascinating.

Tim Dillon (17:37.360)

Yeah, it's fascinating.

Lex Fridman (17:38.440)

Because I speak to people at YouTube and I go,

Lex Fridman (17:39.880)

hey, man, what's going on here?

Lex Fridman (17:41.200)

One of my episode titles of my podcast

Tim Dillon (17:43.560)

was called Knife Fight in Malibu.

Lex Fridman (17:45.720)

It was about real estate.

Lex Fridman (17:47.720)

And it was because a realtor in Malibu,

Lex Fridman (17:50.040)

I was trying to get a summer rental,

Tim Dillon (17:51.320)

which I can't really afford,

Lex Fridman (17:52.320)

but I don't think that's a huge problem.

Tim Dillon (17:55.080)

I follow my dreams.

Lex Fridman (17:56.720)

So I called a realtor and she said, listen,

Tim Dillon (17:59.080)

she goes, I don't know what the government's saying,

Lex Fridman (18:01.000)

but she goes, it's a real knife fight out here.

Tim Dillon (18:03.280)

You know, an old grizzled woman, real realtor,

Lex Fridman (18:05.040)

tanned skin, sig out the mouth, driving a Porsche.

Tim Dillon (18:08.640)

It's a real knife fight out here.

Lex Fridman (18:10.320)

Her entire life had become real estate.

Tim Dillon (18:12.480)

Her soul had been hollowed out.

Lex Fridman (18:14.000)

Her kids hate her.

Tim Dillon (18:15.720)

No one's made her come in years,

Lex Fridman (18:16.920)

but she just loves heated kitchen floors infused.

Tim Dillon (18:20.120)

Fun.

Lex Fridman (18:20.960)

She's a demon from hell and we need them, truly.

Tim Dillon (18:23.800)

We're getting rid of them.

Lex Fridman (18:24.920)

It's not good.

Lex Fridman (18:26.120)

And she goes, it's a real knife fight out here.

Lex Fridman (18:27.920)

So we put that in the episode title.

Lex Fridman (18:30.040)

And of course, I guess some algorithm thought

Lex Fridman (18:31.960)

that we were showing like people stabbing each other

Tim Dillon (18:34.040)

in a Wendy's and we got like demonetized.

Lex Fridman (18:37.760)

Did we get demonetized?

Tim Dillon (18:41.120)

We lost a lot of views

Lex Fridman (18:42.240)

because we were kicked out of whatever out,

Tim Dillon (18:43.640)

like we're just kicked out.

Lex Fridman (18:44.880)

And then I was asking YouTube about it.

Tim Dillon (18:46.320)

They were kind of understanding it.

Lex Fridman (18:47.600)

But even the people that work there

Tim Dillon (18:49.320)

didn't truly seem to understand the algorithm.

Lex Fridman (18:51.840)

So can you explain to me how that works

Lex Fridman (18:53.600)

where they barely know what's going on?

Lex Fridman (18:55.240)

No, they do not understand the full dynamics

Tim Dillon (18:58.200)

of the monster or the amazing thing that they've created.

Lex Fridman (19:01.480)

It's the amount of content that's being created

Tim Dillon (19:04.520)

is larger than anyone understands.

Lex Fridman (19:06.320)

Like this is huge.

Tim Dillon (19:07.520)

They can't deal with it.

Lex Fridman (19:08.440)

The teams aren't large enough to deal with it.

Tim Dillon (19:10.800)

There's like special cases.

Lex Fridman (19:13.120)

So if you fall into the category of special case,

Lex Fridman (19:15.560)

so we can maybe talk about that, like a Donald Trump,

Lex Fridman (19:18.200)

where you like actually have meetings

Tim Dillon (19:20.080)

about what to do with this particular account.

Lex Fridman (19:22.240)

But everything outside of that is all algorithms.

Tim Dillon (19:24.840)

They get reported by people

Lex Fridman (19:27.400)

and they get, like if enough people report

Tim Dillon (19:30.200)

a particular video, a particular tweet,

Lex Fridman (19:32.680)

it rises up to where humans look over it.

Lex Fridman (19:36.560)

But the initial step of the reporting

Lex Fridman (19:40.840)

and the rising up to the human supervision

Tim Dillon (19:45.480)

is done by algorithm.

Lex Fridman (19:46.480)

And they don't understand the dynamics of that

Tim Dillon (19:48.280)

because we're talking about billions of tweets.

Lex Fridman (19:50.440)

We're talking about hundreds of thousands of hours

Tim Dillon (19:55.400)

of video uploaded every day.

Lex Fridman (19:58.240)

Now, the hilarity of it

Tim Dillon (1:00:01.520)

Great question.

Lex Fridman (1:00:02.800)

Well, he didn't, right?

Tim Dillon (1:00:04.080)

Cause we didn't, he wasn't political

Lex Fridman (1:00:06.120)

until four years ago, right?

Tim Dillon (1:00:07.800)

He got political very quickly before.

Lex Fridman (1:00:10.400)

I mean, he was always firing off crazy tweets

Tim Dillon (1:00:12.040)

about where Obama was born or whatever,

Lex Fridman (1:00:14.040)

but he was, he got into politics like very quickly

Lex Fridman (1:00:17.880)

and then he became the president, right?

Lex Fridman (1:00:19.200)

So it was like, we didn't, I knew him as Donald Trump,

Tim Dillon (1:00:22.040)

this crazy New York city character,

Lex Fridman (1:00:23.760)

the coast of the apprentice.

Tim Dillon (1:00:26.000)

I didn't think much about him.

Lex Fridman (1:00:27.440)

He was just constant, you know,

Tim Dillon (1:00:29.080)

like he was just this constant figure.

Lex Fridman (1:00:31.280)

Like I don't think much about Warren Buffett.

Tim Dillon (1:00:33.000)

Like I know like Trump's like,

Lex Fridman (1:00:34.160)

he's married to a new show girl all the time

Lex Fridman (1:00:37.640)

and he's always opening another casino and he's on TV.

Lex Fridman (1:00:41.000)

Wait, Warren Buffett really?

Tim Dillon (1:00:41.960)

No, Trump.

Lex Fridman (1:00:42.800)

Trump, but like Warren Buffett is the opposite, right?

Tim Dillon (1:00:44.920)

Warren Buffett's like been married for a billion years,

Lex Fridman (1:00:47.440)

lives in a little house in Omaha,

Lex Fridman (1:00:48.680)

but these are the, that's what I associate Trump.

Lex Fridman (1:00:50.360)

Like I don't think about Warren Buffett.

Tim Dillon (1:00:52.200)

I don't think about these people.

Lex Fridman (1:00:53.560)

They're just guys that I've known forever

Tim Dillon (1:00:55.640)

that have like, you know,

Lex Fridman (1:01:00.320)

you associate certain things with them, right?

Lex Fridman (1:01:02.520)

And Trump, we always associated with kind of vulgar,

Lex Fridman (1:01:04.760)

garish, new money, billionaire, married a lot,

Tim Dillon (1:01:08.280)

you know, casinos, Miss Universe pageants.

Lex Fridman (1:01:10.760)

But again, you know, but it makes perfect sense

Tim Dillon (1:01:13.640)

that he really was able to become president at the moment

Lex Fridman (1:01:19.200)

where we were about to have Hillary Clinton versus Jeb Bush.

Lex Fridman (1:01:22.520)

And I think Americans felt like this is,

Lex Fridman (1:01:24.720)

now the oligarchy is spitting right in our face.

Tim Dillon (1:01:27.560)

You're not even making it feel like

Lex Fridman (1:01:30.400)

there's an appearance of democracy.

Tim Dillon (1:01:32.520)

We have two crime families

Lex Fridman (1:01:34.240)

vowing for control of the country every four years.

Lex Fridman (1:01:37.080)

And then there was this rogue kind of upstart guy

Lex Fridman (1:01:40.480)

that was really about himself.

Tim Dillon (1:01:42.320)

You know, Trump doesn't really care that much about the,

Lex Fridman (1:01:44.440)

I mean, really was summarized perfectly when he left

Lex Fridman (1:01:46.640)

and he just said, hey, have a good life.

Lex Fridman (1:01:48.640)

That's what he said

Tim Dillon (1:01:49.480)

before he got on Andrews Air Force Base.

Lex Fridman (1:01:51.160)

If you watch his speech, he goes, hey, have a good life.

Tim Dillon (1:01:53.720)

That's what he really feel.

Lex Fridman (1:01:56.520)

Like, hey, have a good life.

Tim Dillon (1:01:58.360)

I'm gonna get on a plane right now

Lex Fridman (1:02:00.640)

and fly to a castle I own in Florida.

Lex Fridman (1:02:05.560)

And really, I'm not gonna think too much about you people

Lex Fridman (1:02:08.960)

outside of how I can get more attention in the future.

Lex Fridman (1:02:12.280)

Can I ask you like a therapy question?

Lex Fridman (1:02:14.800)

What is your favorite

Lex Fridman (1:02:17.680)

and least favorite quality of Donald Trump?

Lex Fridman (1:02:21.640)

So my least favorite quality of Donald Trump,

Tim Dillon (1:02:24.920)

I think because there's a few of them,

Lex Fridman (1:02:28.760)

his lack of empathy,

Tim Dillon (1:02:33.400)

complete and total lack of empathy.

Lex Fridman (1:02:35.160)

I don't feel that he cares about human beings on any level.

Lex Fridman (1:02:39.160)

And I feel like that's,

Lex Fridman (1:02:40.680)

maybe it should be a requirement, right?

Tim Dillon (1:02:43.560)

I mean, I don't think he cares.

Lex Fridman (1:02:45.160)

I think it's obvious that he doesn't care.

Tim Dillon (1:02:46.480)

I mean, he sent, you know, basically he's saying like,

Lex Fridman (1:02:49.240)

they're in there, Mike Pence is in there.

Tim Dillon (1:02:50.640)

He knows that his people are going to get,

Lex Fridman (1:02:53.800)

try to get into a Capitol.

Tim Dillon (1:02:54.640)

I mean, those motherfuckers are not gonna have jobs.

Lex Fridman (1:02:56.800)

They're gonna go to federal prison and he doesn't care.

Tim Dillon (1:03:00.640)

As long as they're storming the Capitol

Lex Fridman (1:03:02.200)

to prove the point that he thinks he won the election,

Tim Dillon (1:03:04.720)

he has no concern for these people, his followers.

Lex Fridman (1:03:08.960)

He leads them lambs to the slaughter, right?

Lex Fridman (1:03:11.240)

So that's not a respectable quality.

Lex Fridman (1:03:13.600)

My favorite quality of Donald Trump

Tim Dillon (1:03:16.040)

is his willingness to call bullshit.

Lex Fridman (1:03:18.560)

So his willingness to call bullshit out.

Tim Dillon (1:03:20.200)

He doesn't play the game.

Lex Fridman (1:03:22.400)

He will, you know, when people say about Putin,

Tim Dillon (1:03:24.440)

Putin kills people, he goes,

Lex Fridman (1:03:25.520)

we kill a lot of people here too.

Tim Dillon (1:03:26.720)

Like he's willing and able to break the fourth wall

Lex Fridman (1:03:31.320)

and say things that no politician has ever said.

Tim Dillon (1:03:33.360)

He's willing to call out hypocrisy, you know,

Lex Fridman (1:03:36.800)

of course not his own, but the media,

Tim Dillon (1:03:40.120)

the members of the political establishment,

Lex Fridman (1:03:41.800)

that's a laudable quality.

Lex Fridman (1:03:43.200)

It's an entertaining quality, right?

Lex Fridman (1:03:45.320)

We all like it.

Tim Dillon (1:03:46.240)

I love, I'm like this guy saying something

Lex Fridman (1:03:48.120)

that a lot of people want said.

Tim Dillon (1:03:50.880)

That being said, it's coupled with no real work or action.

Lex Fridman (1:03:54.080)

So it's not coupled with anything behind it

Tim Dillon (1:03:56.520)

that he just wants to,

Lex Fridman (1:03:58.400)

we did an episode of my podcast once

Tim Dillon (1:03:59.800)

where it's like essentially he's like criticizing

Lex Fridman (1:04:01.160)

the deep state, he wants a deeper state.

Tim Dillon (1:04:03.400)

He wants a deeper state.

Lex Fridman (1:04:04.440)

Like he hired his daughter and her husband.

Tim Dillon (1:04:07.880)

I mean, this is not a guy that's interested

Lex Fridman (1:04:09.600)

in transparency and openness.

Tim Dillon (1:04:11.400)

He's a guy that would just prefer,

Lex Fridman (1:04:13.840)

he wants to run the mafia state.

Lex Fridman (1:04:16.720)

But he shakes up the norms of social discourse,

Lex Fridman (1:04:20.760)

political discourse, and that people

Tim Dillon (1:04:22.520)

are just hungry for that.

Lex Fridman (1:04:24.560)

Like he got banned from Twitter,

Tim Dillon (1:04:26.960)

from all the different platforms.

Lex Fridman (1:04:29.080)

Do you think, is there an argument to be made

Lex Fridman (1:04:31.560)

for and against banning Twitter?

Lex Fridman (1:04:33.400)

There's always arguments to be made for everything.

Tim Dillon (1:04:35.680)

A permanent ban seems to be an overreaction to me.

Lex Fridman (1:04:38.200)

He's the president of the United States.

Tim Dillon (1:04:39.720)

It also rearranges the power,

Lex Fridman (1:04:41.160)

like whether you like him or hate him,

Tim Dillon (1:04:42.440)

love him or hate him, he was the president.

Lex Fridman (1:04:45.520)

We've elevated Twitter is now more powerful

Tim Dillon (1:04:47.680)

than the president.

Lex Fridman (1:04:48.760)

It's like, do you want that to be longterm the salute,

Tim Dillon (1:04:51.200)

that the reality, like now Jack at Twitter

Lex Fridman (1:04:53.920)

is more powerful than the president of the United States.

Lex Fridman (1:04:56.520)

Is that a good paradigm going forward?

Lex Fridman (1:05:00.040)

I don't know.

Tim Dillon (1:05:01.440)

I'm not, listen, maybe give him a little time out

Lex Fridman (1:05:03.600)

for a few days.

Tim Dillon (1:05:05.000)

I think a time out, a little spanking, certainly,

Lex Fridman (1:05:08.320)

but I don't know if a permanent ban across the board

Tim Dillon (1:05:10.840)

on every social media.

Lex Fridman (1:05:11.920)

I mean, they banned them on Grindr.

Lex Fridman (1:05:13.240)

I mean, this is how hilarious it is, right?

Lex Fridman (1:05:14.920)

I mean, they banned them across the board on everything.

Tim Dillon (1:05:17.560)

I don't think he could get an Airbnb now, neither can I,

Lex Fridman (1:05:19.760)

but like, I don't think he can do anything.

Tim Dillon (1:05:22.800)

Again, I just, I look back and there's so many people,

Lex Fridman (1:05:25.320)

my very smart, intelligent friends that go,

Lex Fridman (1:05:26.760)

yeah, but who cares?

Lex Fridman (1:05:27.680)

Yeah, but he's bad.

Tim Dillon (1:05:28.760)

Yeah, but blah, blah, blah.

Lex Fridman (1:05:29.760)

Yeah, but I don't like Milianopolis.

Tim Dillon (1:05:31.360)

Yeah, but blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Lex Fridman (1:05:32.800)

And I'm like, you have such faith.

Tim Dillon (1:05:35.280)

You have such faith that it's always gonna be the people

Lex Fridman (1:05:39.040)

you dislike that are banned.

Tim Dillon (1:05:40.560)

It's always gonna be the, it's never gonna be you.

Lex Fridman (1:05:43.120)

Man, you have so much faith in the government.

Tim Dillon (1:05:45.320)

You have so much faith in tech oligarchs you've never met.

Lex Fridman (1:05:48.160)

You have so much faith in the security state

Tim Dillon (1:05:51.440)

that they're gonna always make the right decisions

Lex Fridman (1:05:53.720)

and they're not gonna penalize people

Tim Dillon (1:05:55.560)

that shouldn't be penalized.

Lex Fridman (1:05:56.880)

To me, I'm like, wow, I've never had that much faith

Tim Dillon (1:06:00.400)

in any human being ever, including myself.

Lex Fridman (1:06:02.200)

I wouldn't want that power.

Tim Dillon (1:06:03.680)

I would start deplatforming people that I hate.

Lex Fridman (1:06:05.840)

I would deplatform my aunt, you know what I mean?

Tim Dillon (1:06:08.400)

I would deplatform everyone I know.

Lex Fridman (1:06:10.640)

I mean, so it's such an insane power to give somebody,

Lex Fridman (1:06:14.160)

like who gets heard, who gets to speak?

Lex Fridman (1:06:16.840)

Yeah, I'm worried about the effect it has

Tim Dillon (1:06:18.520)

on people like you, actually.

Lex Fridman (1:06:20.080)

I agree.

Tim Dillon (1:06:20.920)

Of being, like everybody's a little more nervous

Lex Fridman (1:06:25.800)

in what they say.

Tim Dillon (1:06:27.480)

Correct.

Lex Fridman (1:06:28.320)

And that is a big problem.

Tim Dillon (1:06:29.440)

Yes.

Lex Fridman (1:06:30.280)

Because then you're just like longterm unmasked,

Tim Dillon (1:06:32.800)

like we're talking about.

Lex Fridman (1:06:33.720)

It has an effect where people just become more bland.

Tim Dillon (1:06:37.640)

Yeah, self censorship, anxiety,

Lex Fridman (1:06:41.880)

all of these things go into it.

Tim Dillon (1:06:43.320)

We try to fight it.

Lex Fridman (1:06:44.160)

I try to fight it.

Tim Dillon (1:06:44.980)

I think I gotta still do what makes me laugh

Lex Fridman (1:06:47.120)

and what makes me laugh is often fucked up.

Lex Fridman (1:06:49.480)

And it's often, it's not always fucked up in a way

Lex Fridman (1:06:52.640)

that it's gonna get me thrown off something,

Lex Fridman (1:06:54.200)

but I think pushing certain buttons is funny to me,

Lex Fridman (1:06:58.400)

so I gotta keep doing that.

Tim Dillon (1:07:00.320)

Part of the problem is that so many of the lines

Lex Fridman (1:07:02.560)

are blurred, right?

Lex Fridman (1:07:03.400)

So you have comedians that are commentators

Lex Fridman (1:07:05.800)

and commentators that are comedians and politicians.

Lex Fridman (1:07:08.360)

So it's harder to get the defense of like,

Lex Fridman (1:07:10.080)

hey, I'm a comedian, leave me alone.

Tim Dillon (1:07:11.820)

That defense becomes harder

Lex Fridman (1:07:13.000)

when all of these lines are blurring.

Tim Dillon (1:07:15.840)

Everybody's kind of everything now.

Lex Fridman (1:07:18.180)

So like people say to me, you should run for office

Lex Fridman (1:07:21.200)

and they're serious and I'm like, you're crazy,

Lex Fridman (1:07:22.960)

but they're serious.

Tim Dillon (1:07:23.800)

Like, so the blurring of everything means

Lex Fridman (1:07:26.740)

that people aren't in their lanes as much

Lex Fridman (1:07:29.240)

and that you go, well, this guy is dangerous

Lex Fridman (1:07:31.960)

because he's not just making a joke.

Tim Dillon (1:07:34.640)

He's doing something else and he's using humor.

Lex Fridman (1:07:38.000)

And I'm like, I'm really not.

Tim Dillon (1:07:38.960)

I'm really just trying to make a joke.

Lex Fridman (1:07:40.320)

That's all, that's really what I'm trying to do.

Lex Fridman (1:07:42.120)

But I do think that because of the flattening,

Lex Fridman (1:07:46.000)

there's a lot of people out there that go,

Tim Dillon (1:07:48.140)

they take aim at humor because they go,

Lex Fridman (1:07:49.920)

humor is where bad ideas can kind of start and flourish.

Lex Fridman (1:07:54.120)

But don't you, to put some responsibility on you,

Lex Fridman (1:07:57.960)

don't you think humor is a way to,

Tim Dillon (1:08:01.120)

that you are the modern,

Lex Fridman (1:08:03.360)

like Jordan Peterson style intellectual,

Tim Dillon (1:08:05.920)

that humor is actually a tool of.

Lex Fridman (1:08:08.160)

It can be.

Tim Dillon (1:08:09.000)

Changing the zeitgeist,

Lex Fridman (1:08:10.040)

changing the social norms. It absolutely can be,

Lex Fridman (1:08:11.760)

but it also cannot be.

Lex Fridman (1:08:12.920)

I don't think it's any one thing

Lex Fridman (1:08:14.400)

and I think there's a lot of pressure for a comedian.

Lex Fridman (1:08:17.560)

You can be funny and right.

Tim Dillon (1:08:18.960)

You can be funny and wrong.

Lex Fridman (1:08:21.080)

If your goal is to be right,

Tim Dillon (1:08:22.880)

you might end up being right and not funny.

Lex Fridman (1:08:25.600)

So the reality is funny has to come first.

Tim Dillon (1:08:27.840)

There are brilliant people that have been funny

Lex Fridman (1:08:30.160)

and correct according to people, right?

Lex Fridman (1:08:33.240)

But at the end of the day,

Lex Fridman (1:08:35.040)

people that put way too much faith in what comedy is,

Tim Dillon (1:08:38.340)

most of what comedy is,

Lex Fridman (1:08:39.720)

is people showing up to strip malls

Lex Fridman (1:08:41.560)

and telling jokes for an hour

Lex Fridman (1:08:43.800)

while people eat chicken fingers

Lex Fridman (1:08:45.160)

and they all get drunk and they laugh

Lex Fridman (1:08:46.620)

and they feel a little bit better about their lives.

Tim Dillon (1:08:48.800)

That's really the majority of comedy.

Lex Fridman (1:08:50.520)

Then there's like 10 famous people that are really famous

Tim Dillon (1:08:53.240)

that do a version of that in an arena.

Lex Fridman (1:08:55.760)

But the amount of cultural power they have

Tim Dillon (1:08:57.720)

has always been greatly exaggerated.

Lex Fridman (1:08:59.640)

My uncles loved George Carlin,

Tim Dillon (1:09:01.440)

who was anti military industrial complex,

Lex Fridman (1:09:03.760)

anti this, anti that.

Lex Fridman (1:09:05.200)

And then they would go vote for Ronald Reagan.

Lex Fridman (1:09:07.040)

They didn't care.

Tim Dillon (1:09:10.920)

It's not as powerful as you think.

Lex Fridman (1:09:12.800)

I wish it was.

Tim Dillon (1:09:13.960)

It feels good.

Lex Fridman (1:09:15.280)

It feels good for me to say I am the new thing.

Tim Dillon (1:09:18.440)

It really isn't.

Lex Fridman (1:09:19.680)

It truly isn't.

Tim Dillon (1:09:20.680)

No one is, comedians are the people that get on stage

Lex Fridman (1:09:23.040)

and say, we're fucked up.

Tim Dillon (1:09:24.420)

We're drug addicts.

Lex Fridman (1:09:26.200)

We're sex addicts.

Tim Dillon (1:09:27.100)

We're fat.

Lex Fridman (1:09:28.120)

We're gross.

Tim Dillon (1:09:28.960)

We can't manage our money.

Lex Fridman (1:09:29.920)

We can't stop eating.

Tim Dillon (1:09:31.160)

We can't stop fucking doing horrible things.

Lex Fridman (1:09:33.120)

We're liars.

Tim Dillon (1:09:33.960)

We're narcissists.

Lex Fridman (1:09:34.780)

We're scumbags.

Tim Dillon (1:09:35.640)

We're the people that get out and say that.

Lex Fridman (1:09:37.480)

Only a psychopath would look at us and go,

Tim Dillon (1:09:40.620)

show me the way.

Lex Fridman (1:09:42.240)

Like it's not.

Tim Dillon (1:09:43.680)

I disagree with you because then I'm a psychopath.

Lex Fridman (1:09:46.880)

Well, and that's, I mean, I don't think,

Tim Dillon (1:09:50.680)

no pushback here.

Lex Fridman (1:09:51.520)

That's another issue.

Lex Fridman (1:09:54.720)

But you know what I'm saying.

Lex Fridman (1:09:55.560)

Well, and I don't because, I mean,

Tim Dillon (1:09:58.000)

I understand you using this as a psychological tool

Lex Fridman (1:10:01.040)

for yourself to give yourself freedom.

Lex Fridman (1:10:03.600)

But the reality is you are one of the rare comedians

Lex Fridman (1:10:06.800)

like a George Carlin who is, besides being funny.

Tim Dillon (1:10:10.680)

When I hear things like that, I'm like,

Lex Fridman (1:10:11.800)

okay, you're being very sweet.

Lex Fridman (1:10:12.820)

But like, I agree.

Lex Fridman (1:10:14.080)

I understand what you're saying.

Tim Dillon (1:10:14.920)

I do stuff that makes, hopefully makes you think.

Lex Fridman (1:10:17.240)

I hope that's what good comedy is.

Lex Fridman (1:10:18.840)

But I think I try to do that.

Lex Fridman (1:10:21.040)

But I also would hate to feel shackled to the idea

Tim Dillon (1:10:25.840)

of that I had to make a point

Lex Fridman (1:10:28.440)

and that point had to be correct.

Tim Dillon (1:10:31.320)

I think the best comedy makes fun of everything.

Lex Fridman (1:10:33.600)

It makes fun of both sides.

Lex Fridman (1:10:34.800)

And then there's a deeper truth about humanity revealed.

Lex Fridman (1:10:38.200)

But then what happens is people take that deeper truth

Lex Fridman (1:10:40.480)

and go, let's politicize it.

Lex Fridman (1:10:42.080)

But what does he mean?

Lex Fridman (1:10:43.080)

Is it the right or the left?

Lex Fridman (1:10:44.160)

And I'm like, I'm doing something that I think speaks

Tim Dillon (1:10:46.440)

to hopefully people on both sides for everybody.

Lex Fridman (1:10:49.120)

Cause I'm making fun of people on the left and the right

Lex Fridman (1:10:51.080)

and in the center and people that don't care

Lex Fridman (1:10:52.600)

and people that do care.

Lex Fridman (1:10:53.480)

And I'm trying to figure out a way to do it.

Lex Fridman (1:10:55.520)

But then immediately anything of value

Lex Fridman (1:10:57.360)

in this culture right now is like, how do we politicize it?

Lex Fridman (1:10:59.680)

How do we put it in a box?

Lex Fridman (1:11:00.960)

So yes, I think comedy can produce a lot

Lex Fridman (1:11:02.920)

of inherently valuable things, reflective, thoughtful things.

Lex Fridman (1:11:07.240)

But then immediately, can it be put in this box

Lex Fridman (1:11:10.440)

where all of those things can be used politically?

Tim Dillon (1:11:13.000)

No.

Lex Fridman (1:11:14.040)

And unfortunately, like when they say like,

Tim Dillon (1:11:15.280)

comedy is a great way to speak truth to power.

Lex Fridman (1:11:17.120)

It is, but I don't know how much it changes things.

Tim Dillon (1:11:23.840)

I don't know how much a joke can dethrone a king.

Lex Fridman (1:11:28.480)

I know the idea is nice,

Lex Fridman (1:11:30.760)

but let's look at the practical applications.

Lex Fridman (1:11:34.320)

I mean, we had brilliant comics, Bill Hicks,

Tim Dillon (1:11:38.100)

George Carlin, Richard Pryor.

Lex Fridman (1:11:40.640)

We had people talk about so many problems in society,

Tim Dillon (1:11:44.120)

illustrate them, put a spotlight on them.

Lex Fridman (1:11:47.380)

And we still have them.

Tim Dillon (1:11:48.760)

They're worse now than they've ever been.

Lex Fridman (1:11:50.520)

That's not true.

Tim Dillon (1:11:51.360)

I think the society is better.

Lex Fridman (1:11:52.640)

And so to push back in my perspective,

Tim Dillon (1:11:55.120)

it's very possible that those voices

Lex Fridman (1:11:58.000)

were the exact reason we have the world today,

Tim Dillon (1:12:00.160)

which I do believe is actually,

Lex Fridman (1:12:03.160)

I mean, on the boring old measures

Tim Dillon (1:12:07.080)

of what makes a good world,

Lex Fridman (1:12:08.760)

which is the amount of violence in the world,

Tim Dillon (1:12:12.160)

the amount of opportunity that all those kinds of measures,

Lex Fridman (1:12:15.640)

even happiness, all of those things measured,

Tim Dillon (1:12:17.800)

things have been improving.

Lex Fridman (1:12:19.040)

Steven Pinker gets a lot of shit for this,

Lex Fridman (1:12:21.400)

but he's really good at articulating

Lex Fridman (1:12:23.720)

how the data says pretty clearly

Tim Dillon (1:12:25.240)

that the world is getting better.

Lex Fridman (1:12:26.720)

And it's arguable that the freedoms we do enjoy currently

Tim Dillon (1:12:30.960)

are thanks to the comedic voices or the people who mock.

Lex Fridman (1:12:34.680)

So to me, it's possible that humor

Tim Dillon (1:12:37.600)

is the very thing that saves the world.

Lex Fridman (1:12:39.480)

Humor is the very thing that keeps,

Tim Dillon (1:12:41.520)

is the balance of power in the world.

Lex Fridman (1:12:44.040)

But I think a lot of the things that those guys criticize,

Tim Dillon (1:12:46.320)

whether it was militarism or the elites,

Lex Fridman (1:12:50.120)

the lying, the corruption, the bribery,

Tim Dillon (1:12:52.280)

that's still going on.

Lex Fridman (1:12:53.560)

And it's always gonna go on, right?

Tim Dillon (1:12:54.720)

Because that's the nature of human beings.

Lex Fridman (1:12:56.320)

We call it out, we point it out,

Lex Fridman (1:12:58.600)

but we don't have a plan to change.

Lex Fridman (1:13:01.000)

It's not really our job.

Lex Fridman (1:13:02.640)

And I think that too much now is like,

Lex Fridman (1:13:05.520)

well, comedians should have a,

Tim Dillon (1:13:07.320)

like, I don't tell people who to vote for.

Lex Fridman (1:13:09.520)

Like the idea that comedians

Tim Dillon (1:13:10.680)

went and told people who to vote for,

Lex Fridman (1:13:11.640)

it's like, to me, it's crazy.

Tim Dillon (1:13:13.160)

I understand like people have strong opinions,

Lex Fridman (1:13:15.520)

but like, I believe I have a job.

Lex Fridman (1:13:17.920)

And my job is to make you laugh or whatever,

Lex Fridman (1:13:19.880)

maybe make you think,

Lex Fridman (1:13:20.760)

but like, my job is not to tell you who to vote for.

Lex Fridman (1:13:23.120)

I mean, it's absurd.

Lex Fridman (1:13:24.160)

But see, the thing you do by the comedy,

Lex Fridman (1:13:27.760)

like on your Twitter,

Tim Dillon (1:13:29.040)

that people should definitely follow.

Lex Fridman (1:13:30.360)

I believe that, Jim J. Dillon, I agree with you.

Tim Dillon (1:13:33.720)

Oh, on this point of,

Lex Fridman (1:13:35.800)

I agree with you wholeheartedly.

Tim Dillon (1:13:37.120)

That people should follow you.

Lex Fridman (1:13:38.520)

Yeah, you give me,

Tim Dillon (1:13:40.920)

you give me freedom to think on my own.

Lex Fridman (1:13:45.040)

Meaning like you're shaking things up

Tim Dillon (1:13:47.280)

to where I don't feel constrained

Lex Fridman (1:13:49.640)

about what I can think about.

Lex Fridman (1:13:51.520)

And that's awesome.

Lex Fridman (1:13:54.000)

Thank you.

Lex Fridman (1:13:54.840)

So you're not telling me what to think,

Lex Fridman (1:13:56.160)

you're giving me the freedom to think.

Lex Fridman (1:13:57.480)

And that's what great comedy does,

Lex Fridman (1:13:59.400)

is I don't often agree with George Carlin.

Tim Dillon (1:14:04.080)

He can get pretty political sometimes.

Lex Fridman (1:14:06.840)

But just the ability to do that's so rare.

Tim Dillon (1:14:10.240)

Podcasts do that too now.

Lex Fridman (1:14:11.680)

Like there's certain people

Tim Dillon (1:14:12.760)

that can really just challenge you to,

Lex Fridman (1:14:15.800)

even when you disagree with them,

Tim Dillon (1:14:16.920)

to sort of be like,

Lex Fridman (1:14:17.760)

oh, it's okay to think about this kind of stuff.

Tim Dillon (1:14:19.680)

Yeah, and I appreciate that,

Lex Fridman (1:14:21.040)

because that's awesome.

Lex Fridman (1:14:21.880)

And I mean, that's great.

Lex Fridman (1:14:23.080)

And a guy like you, who's a brilliant guy, that's great.

Tim Dillon (1:14:25.280)

If I'm giving you the license to think,

Lex Fridman (1:14:28.080)

then man, the world is completely fucked.

Lex Fridman (1:14:30.560)

But I'm happy about that.

Lex Fridman (1:14:31.680)

Yeah.

Tim Dillon (1:14:32.520)

No, it's...

Lex Fridman (1:14:33.360)

Well, you know.

Tim Dillon (1:14:35.680)

Speaking about the world being completely fucked,

Lex Fridman (1:14:38.520)

Alex Jones turned on QAnon.

Tim Dillon (1:14:40.640)

I know almost nothing...

Lex Fridman (1:14:41.480)

It's a very tough match.

Tim Dillon (1:14:42.440)

They had a rough marriage.

Lex Fridman (1:14:43.640)

They fought it.

Tim Dillon (1:14:44.600)

They fought it out for years.

Lex Fridman (1:14:46.680)

And eventually we just knew

Tim Dillon (1:14:48.200)

someone was gonna leave someone.

Lex Fridman (1:14:50.520)

Hewlett tried to leave him a few months ago.

Tim Dillon (1:14:52.800)

Oh, so...

Lex Fridman (1:14:53.640)

Yeah, he was staying at someone else's house.

Tim Dillon (1:14:55.520)

The car wasn't in the driveway.

Lex Fridman (1:14:57.080)

Yeah.

Tim Dillon (1:14:58.560)

Well, the thing about QAnon that makes it a lot of fun

Lex Fridman (1:15:01.680)

is it's kind of a make it up as you go along.

Lex Fridman (1:15:04.000)

I'm a drug addict, right?

Lex Fridman (1:15:06.000)

So often my lies aren't planned.

Tim Dillon (1:15:09.080)

They're in the moment.

Lex Fridman (1:15:10.000)

A lot of what I do on the podcast,

Tim Dillon (1:15:11.160)

a lot, you know, it's all in the moment.

Lex Fridman (1:15:12.320)

I'll have an idea what I wanna talk about,

Lex Fridman (1:15:13.520)

and I rant and I go.

Lex Fridman (1:15:14.760)

And I've been like stoned,

Lex Fridman (1:15:16.400)

and I show up at home,

Lex Fridman (1:15:17.480)

and my parents are like,

Lex Fridman (1:15:18.560)

what's going on?

Lex Fridman (1:15:19.680)

There was $50 on the mantle.

Tim Dillon (1:15:21.080)

Now it's not there.

Lex Fridman (1:15:22.480)

And I'm like,

Lex Fridman (1:15:23.400)

well, and I gotta make something up on the spot, right?

Lex Fridman (1:15:28.640)

I've been, you know, are you drinking again?

Tim Dillon (1:15:31.000)

No, I'm not.

Lex Fridman (1:15:33.280)

And then you gotta have a,

Tim Dillon (1:15:34.560)

well, you were gone for two days.

Lex Fridman (1:15:35.760)

No one knows where you were.

Lex Fridman (1:15:36.720)

And somebody said you left your car.

Lex Fridman (1:15:37.880)

Well, I was at, well, this is,

Tim Dillon (1:15:40.040)

I was at a sales conference and I left my car.

Lex Fridman (1:15:42.480)

I flew to Phoenix.

Tim Dillon (1:15:43.400)

Like, I understand what that is.

Lex Fridman (1:15:45.040)

QAnon is an ever evolving conspiracy theory

Tim Dillon (1:15:47.680)

where the events are happening in the past,

Lex Fridman (1:15:50.400)

in the present, and in the future.

Tim Dillon (1:15:51.600)

It's kind of hilarious.

Lex Fridman (1:15:52.520)

Every conspiracy theory is like Kennedy,

Tim Dillon (1:15:54.320)

something like that,

Lex Fridman (1:15:55.160)

that there's a lot of truth in that,

Tim Dillon (1:15:56.240)

or all truth.

Lex Fridman (1:15:57.280)

But at the end of the day,

Tim Dillon (1:15:58.280)

it's like you're looking back from 30,000 feet,

Lex Fridman (1:16:00.280)

analyzing little things that have already happened.

Tim Dillon (1:16:02.360)

QAnon's like,

Lex Fridman (1:16:03.200)

so I think Alex is kind of like got a little tired of

Tim Dillon (1:16:06.360)

the constant evolving nature of that conspiracy theory.

Lex Fridman (1:16:11.040)

So he's not a fan of like the jazz that is QAnon.

Lex Fridman (1:16:14.040)

So they're not,

Lex Fridman (1:16:14.880)

because they're improvising constantly.

Tim Dillon (1:16:15.960)

They're improvising.

Lex Fridman (1:16:16.800)

Alex is like, hey man,

Tim Dillon (1:16:17.960)

I was on board a little bit,

Lex Fridman (1:16:19.320)

but at the end of the day,

Tim Dillon (1:16:20.240)

it's getting a little annoying

Lex Fridman (1:16:21.120)

because it can turn on you.

Tim Dillon (1:16:22.680)

Eventually you become part of the conspiracy.

Lex Fridman (1:16:25.080)

Alex is controlled opposition.

Tim Dillon (1:16:26.520)

That's what they'll say.

Lex Fridman (1:16:27.800)

Eventually you,

Tim Dillon (1:16:29.400)

because QAnon just eats things.

Lex Fridman (1:16:31.480)

So it's a conspiracy that just eats things.

Tim Dillon (1:16:33.320)

The minute you start to say,

Lex Fridman (1:16:34.160)

hey man, maybe that's not,

Tim Dillon (1:16:35.720)

it just eats you and go,

Lex Fridman (1:16:36.840)

well, you're in on it.

Tim Dillon (1:16:38.200)

Everyone's in on it.

Lex Fridman (1:16:39.040)

Everyone's a satanic pedophile.

Tim Dillon (1:16:40.200)

Everybody.

Lex Fridman (1:16:41.040)

Everyone that questions it is eating children.

Lex Fridman (1:16:43.640)

And you go, wait a minute,

Lex Fridman (1:16:45.160)

that seems illogical.

Lex Fridman (1:16:46.920)

But now there's not enough children.

Lex Fridman (1:16:48.280)

Now there's not enough.

Lex Fridman (1:16:49.600)

And I think QAnon's over now, unfortunately,

Lex Fridman (1:16:53.520)

because for these people,

Lex Fridman (1:16:54.560)

but I think fortunately for them,

Lex Fridman (1:16:56.000)

they're gonna have to find a new hobby.

Lex Fridman (1:16:57.520)

But I think it's over now

Lex Fridman (1:16:58.440)

because even the best QAnon people now are starting to go,

Tim Dillon (1:17:00.920)

hey man, this might not be going down the way we thought.

Lex Fridman (1:17:03.760)

But they've literally gone as far as to say

Tim Dillon (1:17:05.400)

that like Biden and Trump switched faces.

Lex Fridman (1:17:07.880)

Trump's actually still the president except Biden.

Tim Dillon (1:17:10.600)

You have to be a real moron now.

Lex Fridman (1:17:13.800)

You gotta be real stupid now.

Tim Dillon (1:17:16.200)

It's at the end.

Lex Fridman (1:17:17.120)

Like it was cool when the Epstein stuff happened,

Tim Dillon (1:17:19.680)

QAnon was like, it was party at Q.

Lex Fridman (1:17:22.920)

And then when the Hunter Biden laptop stuff

Tim Dillon (1:17:24.760)

started to happen, they were like dancing,

Lex Fridman (1:17:26.800)

like it's time.

Lex Fridman (1:17:28.480)

And then Biden wins and they're like, wait, whoa.

Lex Fridman (1:17:34.720)

And it's just like, it's the day after the party.

Tim Dillon (1:17:36.680)

QAnon, if you ever went to a party in high school

Lex Fridman (1:17:38.520)

or college, QAnon right now is the day after the party.

Tim Dillon (1:17:40.840)

You wake up, it's 12 noon.

Lex Fridman (1:17:43.560)

The sun is hitting you in the face.

Tim Dillon (1:17:44.640)

You're hung over.

Lex Fridman (1:17:45.480)

There's a stench of disgusting beer and cigarettes

Tim Dillon (1:17:47.760)

all over the house.

Lex Fridman (1:17:48.600)

You're like, what the fuck happened here?

Tim Dillon (1:17:50.840)

I gotta get out of here and get a bacon, egg and cheese.

Lex Fridman (1:17:53.640)

That's what QAnon is.

Tim Dillon (1:17:55.080)

They gotta sober up, get out of that house,

Lex Fridman (1:17:57.040)

get a bacon, egg and cheese and go, man,

Tim Dillon (1:17:58.680)

we were fucking whacked.

Lex Fridman (1:18:00.840)

We were high, dude.

Tim Dillon (1:18:02.120)

I thought Nancy Pelosi was eating children for four years

Lex Fridman (1:18:05.200)

and that Donald Trump was gonna put her in Guantanamo Bay.

Tim Dillon (1:18:08.400)

Wow, that was, cause I mean, it's interesting.

Lex Fridman (1:18:12.080)

People had to do that after the sixties.

Tim Dillon (1:18:14.000)

They were like, yeah, I just did a bunch of acid

Lex Fridman (1:18:15.960)

and I lived in a ranch in Malibu

Lex Fridman (1:18:17.400)

and fucked everyone I ever saw.

Lex Fridman (1:18:19.960)

And they're like, I thought that was the way

Tim Dillon (1:18:21.520)

the world was gonna go and I followed some shaman guy,

Lex Fridman (1:18:25.000)

some guru who just wanted to fuck me

Lex Fridman (1:18:26.680)

and 10 other people that were living there.

Lex Fridman (1:18:28.760)

And we did that for three years.

Tim Dillon (1:18:30.520)

Apparently we never created the utopia

Lex Fridman (1:18:32.440)

we thought we were gonna have.

Lex Fridman (1:18:33.640)

And now I'm back working here at Allstate Insurance

Lex Fridman (1:18:37.240)

and we have great policies and we'd love you

Tim Dillon (1:18:39.640)

to come in the office so we can break them down for you.

Lex Fridman (1:18:42.080)

It all ends folks, all the love, all the bullshit ends,

Lex Fridman (1:18:45.760)

but it's fun, they have so much fun.

Lex Fridman (1:18:47.960)

QAnon was hard to get mad at because they were,

Tim Dillon (1:18:50.800)

this was all they had.

Lex Fridman (1:18:53.320)

Yeah, and they were quite good at it.

Lex Fridman (1:18:56.760)

And they were good at it and it was a lot

Lex Fridman (1:18:59.720)

of desperate people, but they were also rich idiots.

Tim Dillon (1:19:02.800)

There's also like dumb rich people

Lex Fridman (1:19:04.600)

and those are like the saddest people in Q

Tim Dillon (1:19:08.000)

cause it's like they should,

Lex Fridman (1:19:09.160)

they have the resources to do other things,

Lex Fridman (1:19:11.400)

but they just love Q.

Lex Fridman (1:19:13.080)

They're like, I'm just into this.

Lex Fridman (1:19:14.880)

And I'm like, you're rich, go do something.

Lex Fridman (1:19:18.640)

How in curious are you?

Tim Dillon (1:19:20.200)

Go to the Amazon, go bird walk.

Lex Fridman (1:19:23.080)

I don't know, but they're, you know, so.

Tim Dillon (1:19:25.000)

Play golf.

Lex Fridman (1:19:25.840)

It's sad, but they're like done now.

Tim Dillon (1:19:26.960)

I mean, it's over.

Lex Fridman (1:19:29.120)

I see you think this is the.

Tim Dillon (1:19:31.040)

I think everything's ending.

Lex Fridman (1:19:31.920)

My whole thing is that Trump's out, QAnon's over,

Tim Dillon (1:19:34.720)

the quarantine is gonna end.

Lex Fridman (1:19:35.920)

Everything's gonna go back

Tim Dillon (1:19:37.760)

to something that's more recognizable.

Lex Fridman (1:19:40.560)

I think that.

Tim Dillon (1:19:42.200)

Are you optimistic about the 2021 and what.

Lex Fridman (1:19:44.840)

To a degree in certain aspects, I have optimism.

Lex Fridman (1:19:48.600)

And then I have, I have short term optimism

Lex Fridman (1:19:50.920)

and longterm pessimism.

Tim Dillon (1:19:52.720)

Meaning that I think in the short term,

Lex Fridman (1:19:54.200)

things can get better.

Tim Dillon (1:19:55.240)

I think longterm, because there's so many forces

Lex Fridman (1:19:57.440)

that are out of our control that are evolving

Tim Dillon (1:19:59.280)

in ways I barely understand that are carving up society.

Lex Fridman (1:20:02.880)

It's gonna be very tough longterm

Tim Dillon (1:20:04.760)

to be completely optimistic.

Lex Fridman (1:20:07.080)

Like, Hey, it's gonna be great.

Tim Dillon (1:20:08.040)

It's gonna be good forever.

Lex Fridman (1:20:09.400)

But short term, I think, yeah, this quarantine will end.

Tim Dillon (1:20:12.000)

Things will get better.

Lex Fridman (1:20:12.840)

The economy will get a little better.

Tim Dillon (1:20:14.600)

The constant Trump craziness will die down a little bit.

Lex Fridman (1:20:18.600)

That's my hope.

Lex Fridman (1:20:19.480)

And people can go back to focusing on things that matter,

Lex Fridman (1:20:22.200)

which is the things that are near you and close to you.

Tim Dillon (1:20:26.040)

Yeah, the humans around you.

Lex Fridman (1:20:27.280)

Humans around you, not Nancy Pelosi.

Tim Dillon (1:20:30.480)

I have uncles that talk about Nancy Pelosi.

Lex Fridman (1:20:32.280)

I'm like, you've never met her.

Tim Dillon (1:20:33.840)

You'll never meet her, shut up.

Lex Fridman (1:20:36.400)

And I have a belief that this kind of local love

Lex Fridman (1:20:40.960)

and kindness that you naturally can have

Lex Fridman (1:20:42.960)

for human beings that you actually know

Tim Dillon (1:20:45.320)

can be expanded at scale through the social networks

Lex Fridman (1:20:49.320)

that we use, that we build.

Tim Dillon (1:20:52.120)

Twitter is currently failing at that miserably.

Lex Fridman (1:20:54.560)

That would be great.

Lex Fridman (1:20:55.400)

But that's...

Lex Fridman (1:20:56.240)

If we were able to increase the love

Tim Dillon (1:20:58.720)

through the social networks, that would be great.

Lex Fridman (1:21:00.920)

It feels very hard to.

Tim Dillon (1:21:03.440)

It's a worthy challenge.

Lex Fridman (1:21:04.880)

You've tweeted, one of the underreported reasons

Tim Dillon (1:21:08.120)

conspiracy theories take hold

Lex Fridman (1:21:10.080)

is because some of them are true.

Lex Fridman (1:21:13.120)

What conspiracy theories do you believe

Lex Fridman (1:21:17.400)

that are sort of important for people to think about,

Lex Fridman (1:21:22.560)

would you say?

Lex Fridman (1:21:24.560)

Kennedy was not killed by a lone gunman

Tim Dillon (1:21:27.280)

with no connections to any other situation, government.

Lex Fridman (1:21:31.200)

I believe that JFK was removed from office

Tim Dillon (1:21:34.720)

by a group of people that had very different interests.

Lex Fridman (1:21:40.520)

But...

Tim Dillon (1:21:41.360)

This is the question of like deep state.

Lex Fridman (1:21:42.200)

So these are powerful people that are able now

Tim Dillon (1:21:45.080)

to dictate through basically the threat of violence

Lex Fridman (1:21:49.680)

what the presidents,

Tim Dillon (1:21:51.760)

the surface powerful people in our society.

Lex Fridman (1:21:53.560)

Yeah, I mean, again, I'm not...

Tim Dillon (1:21:55.360)

I want another investigation into 9 11,

Lex Fridman (1:21:58.160)

not because I think that George Bush pressed a button

Lex Fridman (1:22:00.360)

and made 9 11 happen,

Lex Fridman (1:22:01.400)

but because we invaded the country of Iraq.

Lex Fridman (1:22:03.680)

And then we, 15 out of 19 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia.

Lex Fridman (1:22:09.120)

There was tons of stuff in the 9 11 report

Tim Dillon (1:22:10.840)

that didn't make sense to anybody.

Lex Fridman (1:22:12.880)

There's tons of stuff about that day

Tim Dillon (1:22:14.600)

that I feel like we just don't know.

Lex Fridman (1:22:16.360)

Yeah, that's...

Tim Dillon (1:22:17.200)

Sorry to interrupt.

Lex Fridman (1:22:18.400)

That's when I, my little aunt life

Tim Dillon (1:22:21.920)

touched upon conspiracy theory world

Lex Fridman (1:22:23.920)

and first learned about Alex Jones is when 9 11 happened.

Tim Dillon (1:22:27.800)

It was very frustrating to me

Lex Fridman (1:22:30.400)

how poorly the reporting and the transparency

Tim Dillon (1:22:33.000)

around what exactly happened, who knew what,

Lex Fridman (1:22:35.960)

all that kind of a basic information

Tim Dillon (1:22:37.480)

that you would hope the government would release, reveal,

Lex Fridman (1:22:42.360)

and use as like a lesson for how we prevent this.

Tim Dillon (1:22:45.920)

Instead, it felt like a lot of stuff was being hidden

Lex Fridman (1:22:48.920)

in order to manipulate some kind of machine

Tim Dillon (1:22:51.480)

that leads us to war.

Lex Fridman (1:22:52.800)

Yeah, that's fair to say.

Tim Dillon (1:22:54.760)

Yeah, I mean, I just don't feel like

Lex Fridman (1:22:56.240)

we've gotten the full story.

Tim Dillon (1:22:57.360)

I don't know what the full story is.

Lex Fridman (1:22:58.520)

I can't, I don't know what it is,

Lex Fridman (1:23:00.320)

but I don't feel like we've gotten the full story.

Lex Fridman (1:23:02.920)

Yeah, there are groups of powerful pedophiles, right?

Tim Dillon (1:23:06.280)

Whether they're in the Catholic church

Lex Fridman (1:23:07.440)

or they're in the government or wherever they are,

Tim Dillon (1:23:08.960)

they are able to cover things up that they do.

Lex Fridman (1:23:11.160)

They're able to silence people that try to out them

Tim Dillon (1:23:13.480)

in terms of like, you know, disrupt their operations.

Lex Fridman (1:23:16.080)

That's true.

Tim Dillon (1:23:16.920)

QAnon has nuggets of truth.

Lex Fridman (1:23:18.600)

It just went crazy.

Tim Dillon (1:23:20.120)

Any conspiracy theory that involves the Knights Templar

Lex Fridman (1:23:23.160)

and also Chrissy Teigen is probably wrong, you know?

Lex Fridman (1:23:27.680)

What's the Knights Templar?

Lex Fridman (1:23:28.840)

Well, it was just this group of Knights back in the day.

Tim Dillon (1:23:32.000)

You know, it's that supposedly secret meetings.

Lex Fridman (1:23:34.680)

And like in every conspiracy, they talk about like,

Tim Dillon (1:23:36.760)

you know, if you go deep enough,

Lex Fridman (1:23:37.800)

it's like the Knights Templar, the Rosicrucians,

Tim Dillon (1:23:40.800)

you know, all of these secret groups throughout history,

Lex Fridman (1:23:43.800)

the Illuminati, the...

Tim Dillon (1:23:45.120)

Oh, and there's a thread that connects all of this.

Lex Fridman (1:23:46.720)

Oh yes, it connects it all to David Spade.

Tim Dillon (1:23:49.000)

I mean, it's a little much.

Lex Fridman (1:23:50.520)

Well, how do you, if you're David Spade,

Lex Fridman (1:23:52.000)

defend yourself, by the way?

Lex Fridman (1:23:53.200)

You ignore it because it's hilarious.

Lex Fridman (1:23:54.760)

And I know David Spade.

Lex Fridman (1:23:55.680)

It's like Hollywood's kind of boring.

Tim Dillon (1:23:57.480)

Yes, there are sex orgies.

Lex Fridman (1:23:58.840)

I'm not invited.

Tim Dillon (1:23:59.680)

I'm sure there's shit going on.

Lex Fridman (1:24:00.920)

Kids do get abused, women get abused.

Tim Dillon (1:24:02.800)

I'll invite you to one.

Lex Fridman (1:24:03.880)

Please, we got the $75,000 dog and then we'll get one.

Tim Dillon (1:24:08.480)

But, you know, me and David Spade,

Lex Fridman (1:24:10.920)

we go out to sushi restaurants, like,

Lex Fridman (1:24:12.960)

and you sit there and you listen to people complain.

Lex Fridman (1:24:15.320)

That's what a lot of it is.

Lex Fridman (1:24:16.920)

What a lot of Hollywood is is deeply sad tragedy

Lex Fridman (1:24:20.160)

that people don't understand that some of it is nefarious

Lex Fridman (1:24:23.560)

and dark and there are problems

Lex Fridman (1:24:24.960)

and there are real power brokers here.

Tim Dillon (1:24:26.720)

It's a dark town, 100%.

Lex Fridman (1:24:29.200)

But the idea that everybody that lives here

Tim Dillon (1:24:31.120)

is in some wide ranging vast conspiracy isn't true.

Lex Fridman (1:24:34.680)

It ignores how humdrum, boring, deeply sad

Tim Dillon (1:24:39.520)

most people's lives are in Hollywood.

Lex Fridman (1:24:41.440)

And it ignores how sad fame is in general.

Tim Dillon (1:24:44.320)

Fame's a sad thing.

Lex Fridman (1:24:46.000)

Not always, but a lot of times it's a sad thing.

Tim Dillon (1:24:49.240)

It's fleeting, it's ephemeral, it doesn't last.

Lex Fridman (1:24:52.280)

It separates you from other people.

Tim Dillon (1:24:55.480)

It's isolating.

Lex Fridman (1:24:57.360)

It can be traumatic depending on what's going on.

Tim Dillon (1:24:59.800)

Obviously it's better than the alternative.

Lex Fridman (1:25:01.640)

If you're trying to be famous,

Lex Fridman (1:25:03.000)

it's better to be famous than not famous, right?

Lex Fridman (1:25:05.360)

I'll say that.

Lex Fridman (1:25:06.560)

But it's a mixed bag to a degree.

Lex Fridman (1:25:09.240)

There are things about it that aren't great.

Lex Fridman (1:25:11.440)

And Hollywood has a deep undercurrent of sadness

Lex Fridman (1:25:14.040)

of people that have not realized their dreams

Lex Fridman (1:25:16.200)

and people that have realized them.

Lex Fridman (1:25:18.640)

Both of those people.

Tim Dillon (1:25:21.240)

The people that win Olympic gold medals

Lex Fridman (1:25:23.000)

can sometimes suffer from depression.

Tim Dillon (1:25:24.760)

Correct.

Lex Fridman (1:25:25.600)

They've lost.

Tim Dillon (1:25:26.420)

Well, somebody said, and I forget who said it,

Lex Fridman (1:25:28.040)

it's a great quote, it's not mine.

Tim Dillon (1:25:29.680)

I think it's from a book, or it might be from a TV show.

Lex Fridman (1:25:31.960)

Sometimes I quote something and they're like,

Tim Dillon (1:25:33.360)

"'That's from like, Charlotte's Web."

Lex Fridman (1:25:35.000)

I'm like, oh.

Tim Dillon (1:25:36.600)

The two worst things are,

Lex Fridman (1:25:37.420)

oh, I think it's from the movie Limitless.

Tim Dillon (1:25:39.280)

I'm like an idiot.

Lex Fridman (1:25:40.240)

But anyway, thanks for having me on.

Tim Dillon (1:25:42.620)

Tomorrow you're gonna make some genius.

Lex Fridman (1:25:43.460)

I will not publish this.

Tim Dillon (1:25:46.600)

It's from the movie, and I think he says,

Lex Fridman (1:25:48.480)

"'The two worst things in the world are not good."

Lex Fridman (1:25:50.520)

Oh, you know what's not from Limitless?

Lex Fridman (1:25:52.440)

I think it's from the movie

Tim Dillon (1:25:55.880)

where Nicolas Cage sold weapons.

Lex Fridman (1:25:58.000)

It was called Lord of War.

Tim Dillon (1:25:59.280)

It's a little better than Limitless.

Lex Fridman (1:26:00.480)

Anyway. That's a good movie.

Tim Dillon (1:26:01.600)

It's a great movie.

Lex Fridman (1:26:02.440)

He said, the two worst things in the world

Tim Dillon (1:26:03.960)

are not getting what you want and getting it.

Lex Fridman (1:26:06.360)

So the undercurrents of sadness

Tim Dillon (1:26:07.600)

that run through Hollywood are,

Lex Fridman (1:26:09.000)

there are two rivers that converge,

Lex Fridman (1:26:10.720)

and there are people that just never had it,

Lex Fridman (1:26:12.520)

and people that have it and go, now what?

Lex Fridman (1:26:14.520)

And so it's a sad place, a tragic place.

Lex Fridman (1:26:16.040)

And there's a lot of, it's boring.

Tim Dillon (1:26:17.840)

That's what people don't realize is like,

Lex Fridman (1:26:19.440)

it's actually kind of boring.

Tim Dillon (1:26:20.840)

Well, life is kind of boring.

Lex Fridman (1:26:21.960)

Life is kind of boring.

Lex Fridman (1:26:22.960)

But there's also like, you know,

Lex Fridman (1:26:24.440)

so I think QAnon's this way to make a lot of it seem like

Tim Dillon (1:26:26.840)

it's super exciting.

Lex Fridman (1:26:28.440)

And listen, I don't want to diminish the experiences

Tim Dillon (1:26:30.680)

of people who've been abused here,

Lex Fridman (1:26:31.520)

because there is a lot of horror here.

Lex Fridman (1:26:33.240)

But the whole QAnon thing was like,

Lex Fridman (1:26:34.680)

everybody in everything is doing, and that's not true.

Tim Dillon (1:26:38.000)

Well, see, just to linger on that a little bit is,

Lex Fridman (1:26:41.640)

Bill Gates, the conspiracy theories around Bill Gates

Tim Dillon (1:26:45.040)

bother me because, this is me, dumb, naive Lex,

Lex Fridman (1:26:50.920)

thinks that Bill Gates did a lot of good for this world.

Tim Dillon (1:26:53.680)

Sure.

Lex Fridman (1:26:54.520)

First, by creating a company

Tim Dillon (1:26:56.560)

that empowered personal computers.

Lex Fridman (1:26:58.840)

And second, by donating a ton of money

Tim Dillon (1:27:01.480)

for like treating malaria in Africa

Lex Fridman (1:27:04.600)

and all those kinds of things.

Lex Fridman (1:27:06.320)

And there's these huge amounts of conspiracies, I think,

Lex Fridman (1:27:10.160)

based on like just replies to whenever

Tim Dillon (1:27:14.000)

Bill Gates does anything.

Lex Fridman (1:27:15.480)

Like, to me, the top replies should be about

Lex Fridman (1:27:19.000)

how inspiring that guy is, to donate so much money.

Lex Fridman (1:27:22.520)

And so sorry to, the thing I'm struggling with is,

Lex Fridman (1:27:27.640)

if I'm Bill Gates, like, how do you behave differently?

Lex Fridman (1:27:32.080)

How do you show people that you're, if you're not,

Tim Dillon (1:27:34.800)

I don't know, doing creepy stuff

Lex Fridman (1:27:36.640)

that they're saying he's doing?

Tim Dillon (1:27:38.200)

Well, I think part of it is that

Lex Fridman (1:27:39.920)

he's done some really good stuff, right?

Tim Dillon (1:27:42.320)

He's an innovative guy, he's on the vanguard

Lex Fridman (1:27:43.960)

of a lot of things, but he's also the antichrist.

Lex Fridman (1:27:47.200)

And I think that that is, you know,

Lex Fridman (1:27:49.360)

they're not mutually exclusive.

Tim Dillon (1:27:51.400)

He is the prince of darkness, as well as some, no.

Lex Fridman (1:27:54.920)

Here's my deal with Bill Gates.

Tim Dillon (1:27:55.960)

He's a Batman villain billionaire,

Lex Fridman (1:27:57.320)

meaning that he's not a villain,

Lex Fridman (1:27:58.440)

but he's got all this money, right?

Lex Fridman (1:27:59.760)

Here's the thing, and I love Musk and all these guys,

Tim Dillon (1:28:01.320)

I know you love these guys.

Lex Fridman (1:28:02.480)

Listen, when you have the kind of money that these guys have

Lex Fridman (1:28:04.640)

and you have the vision that they have,

Lex Fridman (1:28:06.280)

and they want society to look a certain way,

Lex Fridman (1:28:08.240)

and a lot of them are doing great things,

Lex Fridman (1:28:10.120)

people, they need to get better at the pushback.

Tim Dillon (1:28:13.000)

They need to get a little better.

Lex Fridman (1:28:14.200)

When somebody says, hey man, what's going on over there?

Tim Dillon (1:28:16.880)

Bill Gates needs to be a little better at going,

Lex Fridman (1:28:18.600)

here's what, because, you know, Bill Gates has the money.

Tim Dillon (1:28:23.680)

You know, I think once he wanted to shoot a missile

Lex Fridman (1:28:26.280)

of dust at the atmosphere to help global warming,

Lex Fridman (1:28:28.640)

and a lot of scientists were like,

Lex Fridman (1:28:29.640)

hey man, that might not be the way to do it.

Lex Fridman (1:28:31.240)

But no one in history, like so few people in history

Lex Fridman (1:28:33.280)

have had the resources to even have that thought,

Tim Dillon (1:28:35.560)

that if you have the resources to have that thought,

Lex Fridman (1:28:37.080)

and you have designs on the way you want society to look,

Tim Dillon (1:28:39.120)

whether it's public health policy or vaccinations,

Lex Fridman (1:28:41.760)

whatever, you have to get a little better

Tim Dillon (1:28:44.440)

at dealing with legitimate critiques.

Lex Fridman (1:28:46.680)

And obviously you're not defending yourself

Tim Dillon (1:28:48.200)

against people that say you're the Antichrist,

Lex Fridman (1:28:49.720)

but like, you need to get a little better.

Lex Fridman (1:28:51.680)

And I feel like Bill Gates and some of those people

Lex Fridman (1:28:53.800)

at that level are like, ugh, PR is kind of like, you know.

Tim Dillon (1:28:57.800)

They're terrible at it.

Lex Fridman (1:28:58.640)

They're terrible at it.

Tim Dillon (1:28:59.480)

They're terrible at it.

Lex Fridman (1:29:00.320)

Him and Zuckerberg are really bad at it.

Tim Dillon (1:29:01.520)

Zuckerberg's horrible at it.

Lex Fridman (1:29:02.680)

He seems especially bad at public.

Tim Dillon (1:29:08.160)

Yeah, and it makes me feel so bad

Lex Fridman (1:29:10.000)

because the problem with being a billionaire

Tim Dillon (1:29:13.200)

is you lose touch with reality if you're not careful.

Lex Fridman (1:29:16.520)

I think Elon is good at, at least so far,

Tim Dillon (1:29:20.400)

maintaining touch with reality.

Lex Fridman (1:29:22.240)

No, if you look at the name of his child,

Tim Dillon (1:29:24.320)

you can clearly see.

Lex Fridman (1:29:25.720)

Listen, I do like him,

Lex Fridman (1:29:27.160)

and I do think what he's done with Tesla,

Lex Fridman (1:29:29.000)

you know, my producer has a Tesla,

Lex Fridman (1:29:30.360)

and he never shuts up about it.

Lex Fridman (1:29:31.640)

Most people that have Teslas never shut up about them,

Lex Fridman (1:29:34.120)

and they think they're part of the development team

Lex Fridman (1:29:36.480)

at SpaceX, and I like that he's created a world

Tim Dillon (1:29:39.880)

where people can get excited about a $37,000 car

Lex Fridman (1:29:43.160)

and never shut the fuck up about it

Tim Dillon (1:29:44.920)

to the point where I have to threaten people

Lex Fridman (1:29:46.560)

with physical violence to get them to stop telling me

Tim Dillon (1:29:49.200)

about that their car drives itself.

Lex Fridman (1:29:50.840)

Oh, you should get a Tesla.

Tim Dillon (1:29:51.680)

Maybe have a few less drinks and a few fewer Vicodin,

Lex Fridman (1:29:54.760)

and you can drive yourself.

Lex Fridman (1:29:55.920)

Have you thought about getting a Tesla?

Lex Fridman (1:29:57.040)

I've never thought about it.

Tim Dillon (1:29:57.880)

You should get a Tesla.

Lex Fridman (1:29:58.720)

I don't like them, they're minimalist.

Tim Dillon (1:29:59.640)

I don't like, I want more.

Lex Fridman (1:30:02.080)

I want more.

Tim Dillon (1:30:03.120)

Get the Cybertruck.

Lex Fridman (1:30:04.040)

I want a Cybertruck.

Tim Dillon (1:30:04.880)

I'm just being a, trolling you by being a salesman.

Lex Fridman (1:30:07.680)

My producer wants a Cybertruck.

Tim Dillon (1:30:09.120)

I want a stagecoach.

Lex Fridman (1:30:10.760)

Old school, stagecoach, horse thief shit.

Tim Dillon (1:30:15.120)

It's going back to that.

Lex Fridman (1:30:16.920)

I live in an area with a lot of horses.

Tim Dillon (1:30:18.240)

It's going back to like whipping a horse.

Lex Fridman (1:30:20.520)

I want an animal to shriek while I go by.

Tim Dillon (1:30:22.920)

You want more suffering in the world, not less.

Lex Fridman (1:30:27.640)

Oh, I think we need it.

Tim Dillon (1:30:28.840)

Okay, but I just don't like that billionaire is a bad word.

Lex Fridman (1:30:33.440)

And it's not necessarily,

Tim Dillon (1:30:35.080)

not every billionaire is a pedophile.

Lex Fridman (1:30:37.120)

I know, but the problem is a lot of like,

Tim Dillon (1:30:39.840)

it's just, you know, Epstein was very smart

Lex Fridman (1:30:41.760)

at like just getting people at that house

Lex Fridman (1:30:43.240)

and taking photos of them.

Lex Fridman (1:30:44.960)

Nobody knew what they were doing,

Lex Fridman (1:30:46.000)

but it's like, it was one of those things where it's like,

Lex Fridman (1:30:47.840)

Epstein was the most social guy ever.

Tim Dillon (1:30:49.240)

Like every photo he's like, hey,

Lex Fridman (1:30:51.560)

and it's like everyone that's ever done anything

Tim Dillon (1:30:54.720)

in the world has been at that fucking island.

Lex Fridman (1:30:57.120)

Every human being is like in a photo.

Tim Dillon (1:30:59.480)

It's just weird, like I'm in,

Lex Fridman (1:31:00.640)

like it's funny me and my friends get together.

Lex Fridman (1:31:02.200)

We don't ever take photos, right?

Lex Fridman (1:31:04.080)

Like last night, a few people,

Tim Dillon (1:31:05.520)

it was my birthday yesterday, I'm 17.

Lex Fridman (1:31:07.840)

And my friends came over and we're just eating dinner, right?

Lex Fridman (1:31:11.640)

And we had a fun night,

Lex Fridman (1:31:12.480)

and just four people that are over, nobody, right?

Tim Dillon (1:31:14.600)

Nobody ever thought like, let's, hey, I wanna remember it.

Lex Fridman (1:31:18.040)

Let's take photos, I'm 36, woo!

Lex Fridman (1:31:21.920)

But everything Epstein did,

Lex Fridman (1:31:23.480)

there's just photos of everybody, it's interesting.

Lex Fridman (1:31:26.480)

Do you think Jeffrey Epstein killed himself?

Lex Fridman (1:31:29.240)

No, I think he was killed by that guy,

Tim Dillon (1:31:32.360)

that guy that they put in his cell, that lunatic,

Lex Fridman (1:31:37.000)

who was that big muscled guy.

Tim Dillon (1:31:38.120)

I think he was just, he did it for money,

Lex Fridman (1:31:40.280)

kept his mouth shut.

Tim Dillon (1:31:41.280)

That's it.

Lex Fridman (1:31:42.120)

Money from whom do you think?

Tim Dillon (1:31:43.560)

Mossad, MI6, CIA, all three.

Lex Fridman (1:31:47.200)

So there's a lot of pressure

Tim Dillon (1:31:48.280)

from a lot of different powerful people.

Lex Fridman (1:31:49.920)

Probably Mossad, CIA more.

Tim Dillon (1:31:52.880)

I mean, it seems very clear that he was working

Lex Fridman (1:31:55.240)

inside of a honeypot intelligence operation.

Tim Dillon (1:31:57.800)

Ghislaine Maxwell's father was an Israeli super spy.

Lex Fridman (1:32:01.120)

Ghislaine Maxwell's working for Israeli intelligence.

Tim Dillon (1:32:03.440)

It would be odd to think,

Lex Fridman (1:32:04.640)

and of course the CIA knows about everything

Tim Dillon (1:32:06.360)

that Israeli intelligence is doing with Americans.

Lex Fridman (1:32:08.920)

So I would think that it's a very cozy relationship

Tim Dillon (1:32:12.000)

with those two intelligence agencies.

Lex Fridman (1:32:13.880)

And I think if you ran it by anyone,

Tim Dillon (1:32:15.800)

I think if you ran it by French intelligence,

Lex Fridman (1:32:17.200)

they'd go, yeah, no, get him.

Tim Dillon (1:32:19.560)

I don't think there was any intelligence service

Lex Fridman (1:32:21.080)

in the world whose job is to protect the powerful people

Tim Dillon (1:32:23.560)

that live in their countries

Lex Fridman (1:32:24.520)

that was against him getting whacked.

Lex Fridman (1:32:27.040)

But do you think it's possible that he's just an evil person

Lex Fridman (1:32:30.000)

who is after manipulating people and also was a pedophile?

Lex Fridman (1:32:33.840)

So that there's a bigger thing.

Lex Fridman (1:32:36.400)

It's not factual that there's a bigger thing.

Tim Dillon (1:32:37.880)

Evil people don't get handed.

Lex Fridman (1:32:39.120)

Those are your facts, Tim Dillon.

Tim Dillon (1:32:40.800)

No, there's the facts of the case.

Lex Fridman (1:32:42.600)

You don't get handed a 65.

Tim Dillon (1:32:44.280)

Show me another evil guy

Lex Fridman (1:32:45.560)

who was handed a $65 million place by Les Wexner.

Tim Dillon (1:32:50.440)

Show me another evil guy

Lex Fridman (1:32:51.960)

that got that type of a handshake deal

Tim Dillon (1:32:55.120)

where he was basically let off without anything

Lex Fridman (1:32:58.480)

after a judge had made a very sweetheart deal for him

Tim Dillon (1:33:02.920)

after he was accused of molesting a 14 year old.

Lex Fridman (1:33:06.240)

Show me another evil guy

Tim Dillon (1:33:07.680)

that doesn't have that kind of backing

Lex Fridman (1:33:10.200)

that has those types of friends, those connections,

Tim Dillon (1:33:12.360)

those types of properties.

Lex Fridman (1:33:13.640)

Show me multiple passports all over the world.

Lex Fridman (1:33:16.880)

So show me a guy without anyone backing him that's doing it.

Lex Fridman (1:33:20.400)

Why did they, so you think he's just an evil guy

Tim Dillon (1:33:23.160)

who is doing this for whom is his own just shits and giggles.

Lex Fridman (1:33:26.960)

He's just getting off on it.

Tim Dillon (1:33:28.320)

Human nature, yeah.

Lex Fridman (1:33:29.280)

Human nature, huh?

Tim Dillon (1:33:30.360)

It's human nature.

Lex Fridman (1:33:31.320)

$70 million limestone mansion.

Tim Dillon (1:33:33.360)

I'm being visibly mocked.

Lex Fridman (1:33:34.760)

Yeah, is it human nature?

Lex Fridman (1:33:36.240)

And it's like poetry.

Lex Fridman (1:33:37.600)

I don't think it's human nature.

Tim Dillon (1:33:38.840)

I think they manipulated human nature,

Lex Fridman (1:33:41.800)

but I think they did it.

Tim Dillon (1:33:43.520)

I think JustLane,

Lex Fridman (1:33:44.360)

I think Epstein was really just a functionary

Lex Fridman (1:33:46.360)

and I think JustLane was kind of a pimp

Lex Fridman (1:33:48.840)

and Epstein was kind of a guy that made the money okay

Lex Fridman (1:33:52.080)

and hid money and things like that

Lex Fridman (1:33:54.280)

and worked for a lot of powerful people.

Tim Dillon (1:33:56.160)

I don't believe in lone pedophiles anymore.

Lex Fridman (1:34:00.040)

I don't even believe that.

Tim Dillon (1:34:01.040)

If you're a pedophile, you're like in a group.

Lex Fridman (1:34:03.880)

You know what I mean?

Tim Dillon (1:34:07.200)

Well, I'm not even going there,

Lex Fridman (1:34:09.440)

but staying on JustLane,

Lex Fridman (1:34:11.160)

so you believe there's some power in her.

Lex Fridman (1:34:13.040)

What do you think happens to her now?

Lex Fridman (1:34:15.360)

Like what are the differences?

Lex Fridman (1:34:16.640)

Great question.

Tim Dillon (1:34:17.480)

I mean, I don't know what'll happen to her,

Lex Fridman (1:34:19.880)

but I imagine she'll get some type of deal,

Tim Dillon (1:34:22.880)

closed door thing years from now

Lex Fridman (1:34:24.920)

when people don't really care about the case

Lex Fridman (1:34:26.840)

and she'll serve some time in a very lax thing

Lex Fridman (1:34:30.360)

or she'll be killed.

Tim Dillon (1:34:31.280)

I mean, again, it's like if she was doing

Lex Fridman (1:34:33.720)

what she was doing, which is I believe a fact

Tim Dillon (1:34:36.160)

that she was compromising powerful people

Lex Fridman (1:34:38.600)

so that they could be blackmailed

Tim Dillon (1:34:40.200)

by the intelligence services of the US and Israel,

Lex Fridman (1:34:47.280)

probably, I don't see how she wasn't doing that.

Tim Dillon (1:34:51.080)

Someone's black, someone's using the photos

Lex Fridman (1:34:53.880)

and the tapes, right?

Tim Dillon (1:34:55.000)

Someone's using that against these people.

Lex Fridman (1:34:57.640)

Someone wants to control these people.

Lex Fridman (1:34:59.280)

Well, who and why?

Lex Fridman (1:35:00.680)

That's the real question.

Lex Fridman (1:35:02.000)

And I think the real question is you wanna exert control

Lex Fridman (1:35:05.560)

over congressmen and senators and presidents

Tim Dillon (1:35:09.080)

because they have the power to make decisions

Lex Fridman (1:35:11.920)

to affect the, but the CIA just works

Tim Dillon (1:35:13.720)

for a lot of very wealthy people.

Lex Fridman (1:35:15.920)

That's what the CIA, so how the CIA started, right?

Tim Dillon (1:35:18.600)

It was lawyers, bankers.

Lex Fridman (1:35:19.880)

They're protecting financial interests

Tim Dillon (1:35:22.160)

of multinational corporations all over the world,

Lex Fridman (1:35:25.080)

overthrowing democratically elected governments,

Tim Dillon (1:35:27.560)

going in and doing subterfuge campaigns,

Lex Fridman (1:35:29.400)

encouraging terror.

Tim Dillon (1:35:30.240)

They were doing all kinds of crazy stuff.

Lex Fridman (1:35:31.840)

I don't see why that would change.

Tim Dillon (1:35:33.280)

I think that's who they still represent.

Lex Fridman (1:35:34.840)

And I think those people want certain policies

Lex Fridman (1:35:38.440)

and certain people pushed forward.

Lex Fridman (1:35:40.080)

And I think those people are controlled.

Lex Fridman (1:35:42.080)

And I think one of the ways to control people

Lex Fridman (1:35:44.040)

is their sexual problems.

Lex Fridman (1:35:46.480)

And that's the way they did it.

Lex Fridman (1:35:49.440)

I wish there was a way to,

Tim Dillon (1:35:51.800)

because everything you just said now is.

Lex Fridman (1:35:54.440)

It makes a lot of sense, doesn't it?

Tim Dillon (1:35:56.320)

I'm being indoctrinated on air.

Lex Fridman (1:35:59.840)

No.

Tim Dillon (1:36:00.680)

You think there's just a,

Lex Fridman (1:36:01.520)

Jeff Ramsey is just a fun, random guy

Lex Fridman (1:36:03.560)

who just wanted to make home movies of presidents?

Lex Fridman (1:36:08.000)

Well, you think I'm just some random guy.

Tim Dillon (1:36:09.720)

I'm just trying to sell myself as somebody

Lex Fridman (1:36:11.880)

who's friendly with the American audience.

Tim Dillon (1:36:14.240)

I believe you are backed by people

Lex Fridman (1:36:16.440)

that want people to be more comfortable with robot dogs.

Tim Dillon (1:36:20.520)

I believe that.

Lex Fridman (1:36:21.360)

I believe you're pushed to be the happy face of AI.

Tim Dillon (1:36:23.760)

Which is why I will edit this part.

Lex Fridman (1:36:24.600)

They shouldn't pick the happier face.

Tim Dillon (1:36:26.160)

Wow.

Lex Fridman (1:36:28.120)

No editing.

Tim Dillon (1:36:28.960)

Joe Rogan's rule, no editing.

Lex Fridman (1:36:30.800)

This is live.

Tim Dillon (1:36:31.880)

No, I mean, I wish there was a way to,

Lex Fridman (1:36:33.760)

for some of the conspiracy theories,

Tim Dillon (1:36:35.280)

to prove that that's not the case.

Lex Fridman (1:36:37.160)

Like what the CIA is.

Tim Dillon (1:36:39.800)

There is some possibility in my mind

Lex Fridman (1:36:42.600)

that institutions like the CIA

Lex Fridman (1:36:45.360)

and different kinds of organizations

Lex Fridman (1:36:47.720)

are driven less by organized malevolence

Lex Fridman (1:36:52.760)

and more by just incompetence.

Lex Fridman (1:36:54.840)

Just bureaucracy, being incompetent.

Tim Dillon (1:36:56.760)

I think that argument gets less and less persuasive

Lex Fridman (1:37:00.480)

when you look at all the things they've been able to do.

Tim Dillon (1:37:03.120)

It's very certain, just like you said,

Lex Fridman (1:37:06.120)

that there's a bunch of them that have done,

Tim Dillon (1:37:08.520)

because there's some conspiracy theories

Lex Fridman (1:37:11.080)

that are dramatic and true.

Tim Dillon (1:37:14.080)

The question is, I wish there was a way to prove

Lex Fridman (1:37:17.480)

that some of them are not.

Lex Fridman (1:37:19.120)

And it's very difficult,

Lex Fridman (1:37:20.200)

because so much is shrouded in mystery.

Tim Dillon (1:37:22.560)

Like one of the things I'm bothered by

Lex Fridman (1:37:24.440)

is when people accuse other athletes

Tim Dillon (1:37:26.760)

of using steroids, for example.

Lex Fridman (1:37:28.760)

And it's just, yes, a lot of people use steroids,

Lex Fridman (1:37:31.040)

but it sucks that people just don't believe you.

Lex Fridman (1:37:35.560)

There's some incredible athletes that look shredded,

Tim Dillon (1:37:37.840)

that look just incredible performers,

Lex Fridman (1:37:40.400)

and everybody just says that they're on steroids.

Tim Dillon (1:37:43.920)

They kind of assume.

Lex Fridman (1:37:44.760)

Yeah, I mean, and people accuse me all the time

Tim Dillon (1:37:47.960)

of being on performance enhancing drugs and steroids.

Lex Fridman (1:37:50.420)

And it is hard, but what I remind them is,

Tim Dillon (1:37:53.320)

it's what my appearance is a result of dedication.

Lex Fridman (1:37:58.880)

But no, it's hard work, diet, exercise, dedication.

Lex Fridman (1:38:02.120)

Are you on keto?

Lex Fridman (1:38:04.000)

I'm on, I'm on keto.

Lex Fridman (1:38:05.360)

I'm doing a version of, you're keto, right?

Lex Fridman (1:38:07.600)

Yeah.

Lex Fridman (1:38:08.440)

So I'm doing a version of keto right now with Brad.

Lex Fridman (1:38:11.520)

And it's, do you see what I mean?

Tim Dillon (1:38:13.200)

You carb up in order to be able.

Lex Fridman (1:38:15.280)

So it's keto with sugar.

Tim Dillon (1:38:16.120)

It's called keto plus sugar.

Lex Fridman (1:38:18.160)

And it's a good diet for,

Tim Dillon (1:38:21.160)

I grew up in the 90s when nobody ever lost weight sadly,

Lex Fridman (1:38:23.720)

because every diet was like,

Tim Dillon (1:38:25.560)

you can eat what you want, just be accountable.

Lex Fridman (1:38:28.240)

No one even knew what that meant.

Lex Fridman (1:38:30.000)

So it would be like my mother being like,

Lex Fridman (1:38:31.480)

if you have chocolate chip pancakes, have a glass of water.

Tim Dillon (1:38:35.640)

Just take a walk around the block.

Lex Fridman (1:38:37.900)

You can go to McDonald's three times a day.

Tim Dillon (1:38:40.040)

Just walk around the block.

Lex Fridman (1:38:41.040)

It's what my parents used to say.

Tim Dillon (1:38:42.080)

My mother would be like, just walk around the block.

Lex Fridman (1:38:44.560)

You're fine.

Lex Fridman (1:38:46.800)

Gonna have a cigarette?

Lex Fridman (1:38:47.680)

Walk 20 steps, walk 20 steps back.

Tim Dillon (1:38:50.000)

It's exercise.

Lex Fridman (1:38:51.400)

So, you know, there's too many conspiracies out there.

Tim Dillon (1:38:54.480)

A lot of them aren't true.

Lex Fridman (1:38:55.320)

A lot of them are bitter, angry people

Tim Dillon (1:38:56.640)

trying to justify their own impotence,

Lex Fridman (1:38:59.800)

not being able to do anything in life.

Lex Fridman (1:39:01.260)

And they're like the people

Lex Fridman (1:39:02.100)

that have done something in life, they're all nefarious.

Tim Dillon (1:39:04.160)

It's all, the car just attacked against me.

Lex Fridman (1:39:05.960)

That's 100% true, 100%.

Tim Dillon (1:39:08.660)

It attracts usually people

Lex Fridman (1:39:11.000)

that have not figured out a way to succeed

Tim Dillon (1:39:14.520)

or haven't succeeded on the level that they want to.

Lex Fridman (1:39:17.640)

But that also being true,

Tim Dillon (1:39:21.120)

there is a fair amount of fuckery going on and provable.

Lex Fridman (1:39:25.560)

And, you know, we just have to, I think, separate,

Tim Dillon (1:39:30.800)

know that these things are often inflated or not true,

Lex Fridman (1:39:34.520)

but know that sometimes they are true.

Tim Dillon (1:39:36.160)

Otherwise it wouldn't exist.

Lex Fridman (1:39:37.920)

If there was no, if there was nothing to JFK,

Tim Dillon (1:39:41.120)

there was nothing to 9 11,

Lex Fridman (1:39:42.640)

if people felt like they were being dealt with honestly,

Tim Dillon (1:39:46.520)

this wouldn't exist.

Lex Fridman (1:39:47.720)

I mean, this exists because there are real questions

Tim Dillon (1:39:50.840)

that people have that don't get answered for whatever reason.

Lex Fridman (1:39:53.720)

And then the vacuum of the refusal to answer those questions,

Tim Dillon (1:39:57.160)

that information vacuum is filled with people

Lex Fridman (1:40:00.120)

like Alex Jones, who are curious

Lex Fridman (1:40:02.120)

and sometimes they're right

Lex Fridman (1:40:03.000)

and sometimes they're horribly wrong.

Lex Fridman (1:40:05.320)

And sometimes they're all over the place.

Lex Fridman (1:40:07.120)

And they're good storytellers and people love stories.

Lex Fridman (1:40:09.100)

And then when there's an absence of actual.

Lex Fridman (1:40:11.800)

Alex is a uniquely American person,

Tim Dillon (1:40:13.900)

like a very interesting, I don't know how many countries,

Lex Fridman (1:40:15.920)

like how many people make a living as a conspiracy theorist,

Lex Fridman (1:40:18.240)

a good living in other countries, right?

Lex Fridman (1:40:20.120)

It's very rare, right?

Tim Dillon (1:40:21.640)

I mean, it's very interesting.

Lex Fridman (1:40:22.560)

And he became like, I know people that knew him

Tim Dillon (1:40:24.400)

when he was a kid,

Lex Fridman (1:40:25.240)

because I'd go to Austin and perform a lot.

Lex Fridman (1:40:27.240)

And he was a guy that would take a bullhorn and yell at cops

Lex Fridman (1:40:29.760)

because he thought DEI checkpoints were unconstitutional.

Tim Dillon (1:40:32.120)

That's what he was doing in college.

Lex Fridman (1:40:33.880)

And he's just went through, he was hated by the right.

Tim Dillon (1:40:35.840)

He was hated by the Bush people.

Lex Fridman (1:40:37.200)

He was hated by them.

Lex Fridman (1:40:38.440)

And he went from being this guy

Lex Fridman (1:40:41.320)

that was considered like a leftist even,

Tim Dillon (1:40:44.040)

like even though he was never a leftist,

Lex Fridman (1:40:45.640)

he was considered this like enemy

Tim Dillon (1:40:48.280)

of mainstream conservatism.

Lex Fridman (1:40:50.880)

Like he was not considered a guy that wasn't a patriot,

Tim Dillon (1:40:53.960)

wasn't this, wasn't that.

Lex Fridman (1:40:55.840)

And he just, wow, like he whines and whines

Lex Fridman (1:40:58.520)

and ends up just being this confidant

Lex Fridman (1:41:01.000)

of a Republican president,

Tim Dillon (1:41:02.520)

very divisive Republican president.

Lex Fridman (1:41:04.400)

And he becomes this populist and everything like that.

Tim Dillon (1:41:06.360)

It's really wild to watch that.

Lex Fridman (1:41:08.060)

But I mean, I do think he should retire eventually

Tim Dillon (1:41:10.360)

just so we could get some, I don't know,

Lex Fridman (1:41:12.480)

it seems like it's a lot to keep doing.

Tim Dillon (1:41:14.880)

Well, I hope this world allows for Alex Jones

Lex Fridman (1:41:17.560)

to continue having a voice because just like you said,

Tim Dillon (1:41:20.560)

he's a, use the word fun,

Lex Fridman (1:41:24.220)

but really he shakes up the norms of our discourse.

Tim Dillon (1:41:28.720)

I do too.

Lex Fridman (1:41:29.560)

I do think we need to put more value.

Tim Dillon (1:41:30.680)

I think entertainment, we do need to say

Lex Fridman (1:41:33.880)

that like there are people that should be allowed

Tim Dillon (1:41:35.520)

to have a voice for entertainment purposes.

Lex Fridman (1:41:37.940)

Right.

Lex Fridman (1:41:38.780)

And that's part of what Donald Trump,

Lex Fridman (1:41:40.920)

now that he's not the president,

Tim Dillon (1:41:42.720)

come on, let the guy, let him talk.

Lex Fridman (1:41:46.120)

Who do you think is the best comedian of all time?

Tim Dillon (1:41:49.280)

Oh, that's a great question.

Lex Fridman (1:41:50.840)

Greatest of all time.

Tim Dillon (1:41:53.000)

You mentioned Carlin, your uncle's liking Carlin.

Lex Fridman (1:41:58.280)

Well, Carlin is great.

Tim Dillon (1:42:00.640)

Carlin is really hard to argue with,

Lex Fridman (1:42:04.520)

but Chappelle is also really great.

Tim Dillon (1:42:08.900)

Louis C.K. is really great.

Lex Fridman (1:42:11.020)

I don't know that there's what Joan Rivers is great.

Tim Dillon (1:42:15.080)

I don't know.

Lex Fridman (1:42:15.920)

You smile at that.

Tim Dillon (1:42:16.740)

Well, she's a beast of a comic.

Lex Fridman (1:42:18.280)

I'm not aware of her standup actually.

Tim Dillon (1:42:19.760)

She's a beast of a comic.

Lex Fridman (1:42:20.800)

Ask Rogue and ask any of them.

Tim Dillon (1:42:23.200)

Kennison's great.

Lex Fridman (1:42:24.200)

So what makes a great comic do you think

Lex Fridman (1:42:26.960)

in the history of comedy?

Lex Fridman (1:42:29.020)

Just like that.

Tim Dillon (1:42:29.860)

Said something at the moment in a way,

Lex Fridman (1:42:33.880)

found a way to communicate with people

Tim Dillon (1:42:35.640)

in the funniest possible way at that moment

Lex Fridman (1:42:38.200)

and illustrated larger truths about life in what they did.

Lex Fridman (1:42:44.080)

And I think that guys like Louis and Chappelle

Lex Fridman (1:42:46.920)

and Pryor and Kennison and Hicks,

Tim Dillon (1:42:50.120)

people like Joan Rivers have done that.

Lex Fridman (1:42:53.160)

And even modern people,

Tim Dillon (1:42:55.000)

people like Maria Bamford's an amazing comedian.

Lex Fridman (1:42:57.720)

It's just a different style of comedy per se,

Lex Fridman (1:43:00.440)

but she's an amazing comedian.

Lex Fridman (1:43:03.000)

Cat Williams is an amazing comedian.

Tim Dillon (1:43:05.520)

He really is.

Lex Fridman (1:43:06.360)

Does he have any, was he the one of the things

Tim Dillon (1:43:09.120)

you kind of mentioned, the communities you mentioned,

Lex Fridman (1:43:11.120)

they were kind of fearless in saying

Tim Dillon (1:43:12.720)

the difficult things that needs to be said.

Lex Fridman (1:43:15.240)

Cat Williams is more, I don't remember his comedy,

Lex Fridman (1:43:17.720)

but I think it's just more wild out there.

Lex Fridman (1:43:20.480)

Well, to an extent that you can watch it.

Tim Dillon (1:43:21.920)

He's got stuff.

Lex Fridman (1:43:22.740)

He talks about stuff.

Tim Dillon (1:43:23.580)

He talks about race brilliantly.

Lex Fridman (1:43:24.920)

He talks about America brilliantly.

Tim Dillon (1:43:26.600)

No, I think there's a lot of stuff there.

Lex Fridman (1:43:28.360)

Of course, Chris Rock.

Tim Dillon (1:43:29.440)

Of Chris Rock, of course.

Lex Fridman (1:43:30.560)

It's so hard.

Tim Dillon (1:43:31.380)

You can't really pick one.

Lex Fridman (1:43:32.280)

You just gotta, there's a class of people

Tim Dillon (1:43:35.040)

that throughout this history of this business,

Lex Fridman (1:43:36.980)

which is not that long of a history.

Tim Dillon (1:43:38.320)

It's pretty much within the last century,

Lex Fridman (1:43:41.960)

that have been really influential.

Tim Dillon (1:43:44.720)

Sometimes it's style, the way they deliver things.

Lex Fridman (1:43:47.000)

Sometimes it's substance of how they, what they're saying,

Tim Dillon (1:43:50.760)

or sometimes it's just a style of what they're saying.

Lex Fridman (1:43:52.960)

And we're only talking about standup comedians, right?

Lex Fridman (1:43:55.160)

So there's a million great comedians.

Lex Fridman (1:43:56.920)

If we're gonna talk about Jim Carrey and Adam Sandler

Lex Fridman (1:43:59.720)

and Chris Farley, these are brilliant.

Lex Fridman (1:44:01.720)

And those guys are bigger influences on comedy,

Tim Dillon (1:44:03.920)

I think, than standups, really, truly.

Lex Fridman (1:44:06.200)

So there's so many brilliant people in the business.

Lex Fridman (1:44:09.520)

Who was, for you, influential, just early on?

Lex Fridman (1:44:12.360)

Hicks was influential, because I'd watch Bill Hicks,

Lex Fridman (1:44:14.300)

and I'd be like, this guy's saying crazy shit on stage,

Lex Fridman (1:44:17.280)

and this is the only way he can get away with it,

Tim Dillon (1:44:18.680)

is because it's so funny.

Lex Fridman (1:44:20.160)

And he was calling out the military industrial complex,

Lex Fridman (1:44:23.720)

and he was talking about the first Gulf War.

Lex Fridman (1:44:25.300)

I remember he said a joke that I heard.

Tim Dillon (1:44:27.240)

It made me sit up straight, and he goes,

Lex Fridman (1:44:29.200)

he was in Canada, and he said, we had a war in the States.

Tim Dillon (1:44:31.200)

He was talking about the first Gulf War.

Lex Fridman (1:44:33.080)

And he said, I was in the unenviable position

Tim Dillon (1:44:35.720)

of being for the war, but against the troops.

Lex Fridman (1:44:38.900)

And to me, I love that joke.

Tim Dillon (1:44:40.600)

It was so funny to me, and I was like,

Lex Fridman (1:44:41.880)

oh, you can't get away with that anywhere

Tim Dillon (1:44:44.520)

other than standing on a stage.

Lex Fridman (1:44:46.680)

You couldn't ever say that in an office, really.

Lex Fridman (1:44:48.800)

And this was before, like, it was like PC,

Lex Fridman (1:44:50.720)

and they said, the other thing,

Tim Dillon (1:44:51.920)

I always knew that comedians had to say shit

Lex Fridman (1:44:55.240)

and have it be funny enough

Tim Dillon (1:44:56.800)

that you couldn't get away with it in polite society.

Lex Fridman (1:44:58.900)

That was the whole point.

Tim Dillon (1:44:59.900)

That was why it was a dark theater or a dark nightclub.

Lex Fridman (1:45:02.720)

That's when people had a few drinks.

Tim Dillon (1:45:03.940)

That's what the art form was, and that's why.

Lex Fridman (1:45:06.820)

So a guy like that was influential

Tim Dillon (1:45:08.160)

because I started watching him.

Lex Fridman (1:45:09.800)

And then, of course, I loved SNL when I was a kid,

Lex Fridman (1:45:12.120)

and I would watch Chris Farley,

Lex Fridman (1:45:13.380)

and I would watch people like even John Belushi

Tim Dillon (1:45:17.020)

going back in the day, but I'd watch Adam Sandler

Lex Fridman (1:45:19.200)

and Will Ferrell and all these guys.

Tim Dillon (1:45:20.620)

I mean, there's so many funny people,

Lex Fridman (1:45:23.120)

but Bill Hicks was kind of funny.

Lex Fridman (1:45:24.780)

And then Patrice O Neill was probably my favorite comedian

Lex Fridman (1:45:27.720)

who's made me laugh more than anybody else.

Lex Fridman (1:45:29.880)

So I think it was you, actually,

Lex Fridman (1:45:32.820)

that maybe on your podcast,

Tim Dillon (1:45:34.980)

we're talking about Patrice O Neill

Lex Fridman (1:45:36.260)

and that he was actually vicious to others.

Tim Dillon (1:45:40.140)

I think he was a little mean to other people,

Lex Fridman (1:45:42.020)

but he was very good to people that he liked, I guess.

Tim Dillon (1:45:44.020)

I think he was like not, I mean, he wasn't,

Lex Fridman (1:45:46.320)

and I've never met him.

Tim Dillon (1:45:47.160)

I have no inside info, but from what I've heard,

Lex Fridman (1:45:49.340)

he was like no nonsense guy, right?

Tim Dillon (1:45:51.620)

He just said what he wanted to say.

Lex Fridman (1:45:53.180)

But I think in terms of comedians,

Tim Dillon (1:45:55.700)

I don't know of anyone funnier than Patrice O Neill

Lex Fridman (1:45:58.300)

who said, in modern times,

Tim Dillon (1:46:01.180)

that said more about our society than him.

Lex Fridman (1:46:03.180)

I mean, he was just a brilliantly funny guy.

Tim Dillon (1:46:05.300)

On the radio, he was funny.

Lex Fridman (1:46:06.980)

On his specials, he was funny.

Tim Dillon (1:46:08.900)

Everywhere, he was funny.

Lex Fridman (1:46:10.140)

And there's something else to be said

Tim Dillon (1:46:11.500)

about the whole medium of comedians doing podcasts.

Lex Fridman (1:46:15.180)

Because it unlocks a weird, special, new thing

Tim Dillon (1:46:19.100)

that changed everything.

Lex Fridman (1:46:20.340)

I mean, Rogan started with that.

Tim Dillon (1:46:22.700)

You're doing that.

Lex Fridman (1:46:25.380)

I think that's a whole nother form

Tim Dillon (1:46:27.620)

of like standups, the ones that have a lot to say.

Lex Fridman (1:46:31.940)

Almost like we get to witness the process

Tim Dillon (1:46:36.580)

of the creation of the jokes in a way, or the mind.

Lex Fridman (1:46:39.620)

The sort of the evolution of the mind behind the jokes.

Tim Dillon (1:46:43.940)

It's just.

Lex Fridman (1:46:45.140)

Comedians relate to social media.

Tim Dillon (1:46:47.160)

Comedians, comedy's, it's a performance based medium.

Lex Fridman (1:46:52.140)

So it's about getting up and doing it,

Tim Dillon (1:46:53.980)

getting up in a club, getting up in a theater,

Lex Fridman (1:46:55.900)

getting up in a bar, getting up wherever you can get up.

Lex Fridman (1:46:58.780)

And comedy for years was about performance.

Lex Fridman (1:47:03.060)

And then on the higher end,

Tim Dillon (1:47:04.100)

it was about movies and TV shows.

Lex Fridman (1:47:06.540)

But we were very slow to get on YouTube.

Tim Dillon (1:47:09.580)

We're very slow to adapt to technology.

Lex Fridman (1:47:11.940)

We're very slow to monetize anything we did on the internet.

Lex Fridman (1:47:16.460)

So podcasting was a way for comics and funny people

Lex Fridman (1:47:19.920)

to kind of get into that space, start earning money.

Lex Fridman (1:47:23.660)

And now because of the pandemic,

Lex Fridman (1:47:25.140)

it's really become essential.

Lex Fridman (1:47:27.020)

And it helps you, and even without the pandemic,

Lex Fridman (1:47:29.100)

it was how you were building a fan base.

Lex Fridman (1:47:32.660)

And that's like, but comics were very reticent

Lex Fridman (1:47:35.500)

to embrace social media at all

Tim Dillon (1:47:36.900)

because they thought it was cheap and they didn't like it.

Lex Fridman (1:47:39.820)

And they thought the people on it were idiots

Lex Fridman (1:47:41.460)

and were unfunny and it was just a blatant,

Lex Fridman (1:47:43.860)

whatever it was, whether it was a money grab

Tim Dillon (1:47:45.640)

or it was just too commercial in a sense

Lex Fridman (1:47:48.500)

where they're like, hey, look at me.

Lex Fridman (1:47:49.740)

Like it was just goofy, right?

Lex Fridman (1:47:51.600)

And then comics, I think got displaced

Tim Dillon (1:47:56.720)

because all the YouTubers came in

Lex Fridman (1:47:58.680)

and all the social media stars came in

Lex Fridman (1:48:00.360)

and they really knocked comics off

Lex Fridman (1:48:03.080)

because now people are much more,

Tim Dillon (1:48:04.880)

like if you ask anyone under 30

Lex Fridman (1:48:06.160)

who their favorite comedian is, they say David Dobrik.

Lex Fridman (1:48:08.920)

And there's nothing wrong with that.

Lex Fridman (1:48:09.760)

David's a funny guy, but like what you,

Tim Dillon (1:48:15.200)

not especially to me a ton, but that's okay.

Lex Fridman (1:48:17.420)

I don't, but he makes people laugh, so he's funny.

Lex Fridman (1:48:21.600)

But he's what people, that's a comedian now.

Lex Fridman (1:48:24.720)

So comics got beat by other people coming

Tim Dillon (1:48:28.460)

into a digital space before they did laying the groundwork

Lex Fridman (1:48:33.380)

and taking it over.

Lex Fridman (1:48:34.960)

And now comics are just trying to stay alive.

Lex Fridman (1:48:38.440)

Like even my podcast, which is people really like it,

Tim Dillon (1:48:41.300)

thank God, and I love doing it.

Lex Fridman (1:48:43.360)

The Tim Dillon Show.

Tim Dillon (1:48:44.500)

Well, thank you.

Lex Fridman (1:48:45.400)

I was late, you know, I mean, I was, I just, you know,

Tim Dillon (1:48:50.740)

I've been podcasting for a long time,

Lex Fridman (1:48:52.180)

but really dedicating myself

Lex Fridman (1:48:53.460)

and putting the resources behind it, I was late to it.

Lex Fridman (1:48:55.620)

Like, I was like, hey, I'm telling jokes on stage,

Tim Dillon (1:48:58.060)

which is great, but I should have been allocating more time

Lex Fridman (1:49:00.540)

to building an infrastructure online.

Lex Fridman (1:49:02.300)

And I wasn't doing it and a lot of comics weren't doing it.

Lex Fridman (1:49:04.620)

Funny comics weren't doing it.

Tim Dillon (1:49:06.360)

Comics should be doing it.

Lex Fridman (1:49:08.060)

And I think when the pandemic ends,

Tim Dillon (1:49:09.300)

a lot of comics will just keep doing live standup,

Lex Fridman (1:49:12.180)

but I will keep, obviously I'm gonna go back on the road

Lex Fridman (1:49:14.620)

and do live standup, but I will keep doing this podcast

Lex Fridman (1:49:16.620)

and building digitally too.

Lex Fridman (1:49:17.460)

But you're also exploring ideas.

Lex Fridman (1:49:19.260)

You're doing like short videos and so on.

Tim Dillon (1:49:21.660)

You're trying to look for different mediums of how to be funny.

Lex Fridman (1:49:26.180)

I wanna be funny everywhere.

Tim Dillon (1:49:27.340)

I wanna be funny everywhere.

Lex Fridman (1:49:28.300)

I love making things too.

Tim Dillon (1:49:29.500)

My producer, Ben Avery, is like a brilliant editor

Lex Fridman (1:49:33.180)

and comedic mind, even though he's not a standup.

Tim Dillon (1:49:36.100)

He's able to, he understands funny,

Lex Fridman (1:49:38.100)

he understands what makes me funny.

Tim Dillon (1:49:39.220)

We're able to make these really, I mean,

Lex Fridman (1:49:41.980)

some of those videos, they're just brilliant little videos,

Tim Dillon (1:49:44.060)

even though they're tiny little videos,

Lex Fridman (1:49:45.460)

they're fucking as funny as anything.

Lex Fridman (1:49:47.580)

And it's not me.

Lex Fridman (1:49:48.860)

It's me working with somebody else

Tim Dillon (1:49:50.900)

to make something really great.

Lex Fridman (1:49:52.860)

And it's that relationship that's very important.

Tim Dillon (1:49:56.820)

In some sense, the medium of a short video is a challenge,

Lex Fridman (1:50:00.180)

just like the medium of a short tweet.

Tim Dillon (1:50:02.260)

Of course.

Lex Fridman (1:50:03.100)

How to say something.

Tim Dillon (1:50:04.980)

I mean, whatever the flavor is of what's in your heart,

Lex Fridman (1:50:08.980)

what's in your mind, how to say it,

Tim Dillon (1:50:10.460)

whether it's the goal is funny or something,

Lex Fridman (1:50:13.660)

or just an expressing idea.

Tim Dillon (1:50:15.780)

I think the whole thing that's important to us

Lex Fridman (1:50:18.220)

is that it's an extension of,

Tim Dillon (1:50:20.220)

really like an extension of your friendship in a way.

Lex Fridman (1:50:22.340)

Like, are you guys laughing at it?

Lex Fridman (1:50:24.580)

Are you guys making each other laugh about this idea?

Lex Fridman (1:50:27.940)

And if that's the case,

Tim Dillon (1:50:29.220)

other people are going to laugh at it.

Lex Fridman (1:50:31.860)

I think so much of the old medium was like,

Tim Dillon (1:50:34.260)

everything was top down.

Lex Fridman (1:50:35.860)

Okay, pitch me this idea.

Tim Dillon (1:50:37.260)

I pitch it to the showrunner.

Lex Fridman (1:50:38.700)

They pitch it to the network.

Tim Dillon (1:50:39.900)

They pitch it to this, to that, to that.

Lex Fridman (1:50:42.020)

Standards and practices, sales,

Lex Fridman (1:50:43.820)

and we got to go through everything.

Lex Fridman (1:50:45.500)

Now it's just like, are me and a few buddies

Lex Fridman (1:50:48.020)

or even just one buddy laughing at this idea?

Lex Fridman (1:50:51.260)

Does it captivate us?

Lex Fridman (1:50:52.740)

And do we see it visually?

Lex Fridman (1:50:55.100)

And also a great line from Roseanne,

Tim Dillon (1:50:58.620)

a guy, not Roseanne, but a guy that worked on Roseanne,

Lex Fridman (1:51:01.940)

the old Roseanne, the great one.

Lex Fridman (1:51:03.300)

He said, is it funny with the sound off?

Lex Fridman (1:51:06.700)

Right.

Tim Dillon (1:51:07.540)

That's what we try to do.

Lex Fridman (1:51:08.380)

That's brilliant.

Lex Fridman (1:51:09.200)

Is it funny with the sound off?

Lex Fridman (1:51:10.100)

When you see me in the dumb things,

Tim Dillon (1:51:11.900)

or me in the Meghan McCain, or me in the thing,

Lex Fridman (1:51:15.140)

is it funny with the sound off?

Lex Fridman (1:51:15.980)

And if it's funny with the sound off,

Lex Fridman (1:51:17.500)

you have a good starting point.

Tim Dillon (1:51:18.620)

That's hilarious, because you,

Lex Fridman (1:51:20.820)

I would say you're one of the people,

Tim Dillon (1:51:22.820)

because most people are not funny with the sound off,

Lex Fridman (1:51:25.180)

most comedians.

Tim Dillon (1:51:26.020)

Like you, Will Ferrell's another example of that.

Lex Fridman (1:51:28.880)

There's something about when I click on one of your videos,

Tim Dillon (1:51:32.620)

it's funny, just like the first thing I see, just your face.

Lex Fridman (1:51:36.820)

We, well, thank you.

Tim Dillon (1:51:37.780)

That's very sweet.

Lex Fridman (1:51:38.620)

But I mean, thank God.

Lex Fridman (1:51:40.280)

I mean, that's what we try to do, right?

Lex Fridman (1:51:41.620)

We're trying to be funny.

Tim Dillon (1:51:42.620)

Yeah.

Lex Fridman (1:51:43.460)

So we're trying to be funny.

Lex Fridman (1:51:45.020)

Can we talk about love a little bit?

Lex Fridman (1:51:46.540)

Sure.

Lex Fridman (1:51:48.100)

So you came out of the closet as being gay

Lex Fridman (1:51:52.420)

when you were 25.

Tim Dillon (1:51:53.700)

Yeah, it was late, very late.

Lex Fridman (1:51:55.780)

Very late.

Tim Dillon (1:51:56.620)

Before then.

Lex Fridman (1:51:57.460)

By today's standards.

Lex Fridman (1:51:58.280)

During and after, how has your view on love evolved?

Lex Fridman (1:52:04.880)

Interesting.

Tim Dillon (1:52:05.720)

It's so hard to say, because like I would,

Lex Fridman (1:52:08.300)

I'd like to make a very like Disneyfied statement

Tim Dillon (1:52:12.240)

about like that you can't be in love secretively.

Lex Fridman (1:52:15.700)

You should be honest.

Tim Dillon (1:52:16.660)

Love should all be about honesty, but that's not true.

Lex Fridman (1:52:18.980)

Right?

Tim Dillon (1:52:19.820)

There's people that are in love

Lex Fridman (1:52:21.420)

that are lying to everyone else,

Lex Fridman (1:52:23.620)

but they're deeply in love.

Lex Fridman (1:52:24.940)

Yeah.

Tim Dillon (1:52:25.860)

I would love to say something like,

Lex Fridman (1:52:27.020)

honesty is an ingredient for love, you know?

Lex Fridman (1:52:30.140)

But I don't know, maybe honesty with each other.

Lex Fridman (1:52:33.020)

But I mean, I think there's a lot of people in the world

Tim Dillon (1:52:35.800)

that aren't honest.

Lex Fridman (1:52:36.980)

My view on love is super important.

Tim Dillon (1:52:39.380)

I think that it's, a lot of society in America

Lex Fridman (1:52:43.460)

is all about love.

Tim Dillon (1:52:44.820)

We don't tend to focus on other things

Lex Fridman (1:52:49.020)

in terms of like, you know, friendship

Tim Dillon (1:52:51.980)

or sustainability of that.

Lex Fridman (1:52:54.740)

Cause I think that a lot,

Tim Dillon (1:52:55.620)

I know a lot of people in relationships where it's like,

Lex Fridman (1:52:58.320)

I don't know, they're not, they are, they love each other,

Lex Fridman (1:53:01.180)

but like, it's also a rock solid couple

Lex Fridman (1:53:03.980)

because they are, they're very compatible

Tim Dillon (1:53:07.700)

in many other ways.

Lex Fridman (1:53:09.020)

Right.

Lex Fridman (1:53:09.860)

So I think that like,

Lex Fridman (1:53:10.700)

They're friends.

Tim Dillon (1:53:11.520)

They have, right.

Lex Fridman (1:53:12.360)

I see friendship and love as the same thing.

Lex Fridman (1:53:13.980)

There's just parts of it that are, right?

Lex Fridman (1:53:15.260)

So it's like, I look at it as like,

Tim Dillon (1:53:18.300)

there is, there needs to be more than just like that,

Lex Fridman (1:53:21.700)

like amazing, like chemistry or physical attraction

Tim Dillon (1:53:25.860)

that is this chemical thing that happens.

Lex Fridman (1:53:28.580)

There should be like some underlying,

Tim Dillon (1:53:30.420)

I mean, again, that's from what I,

Lex Fridman (1:53:32.820)

that's what I've observed as really long lasting,

Tim Dillon (1:53:36.100)

successful relationships.

Lex Fridman (1:53:37.620)

Well, is there something about coming out that,

Tim Dillon (1:53:42.380)

that was, that you took away,

Lex Fridman (1:53:45.820)

that you remember as profound,

Tim Dillon (1:53:47.680)

Yes.

Lex Fridman (1:53:48.520)

That it was my, that I, it wasn't society, it was me.

Lex Fridman (1:53:52.680)

So there were kids that were out in my high school

Lex Fridman (1:53:55.180)

that I waited years later to do it.

Tim Dillon (1:53:58.580)

That was no one's fault but my own.

Lex Fridman (1:54:00.460)

So I was taking a cowardly way out

Lex Fridman (1:54:02.640)

and a lot of people.

Lex Fridman (1:54:03.500)

So I could blame society or like,

Tim Dillon (1:54:06.060)

oh, I lived in a conservative area

Lex Fridman (1:54:07.820)

and I grew up in that.

Tim Dillon (1:54:09.780)

You should take responsibility for your own decisions.

Lex Fridman (1:54:11.820)

And if you're being cowardly,

Tim Dillon (1:54:12.740)

admit that you're being cowardly.

Lex Fridman (1:54:14.460)

So that's what I took out of it is that

Tim Dillon (1:54:16.180)

it's not society's fault that you chose to be a coward.

Lex Fridman (1:54:19.180)

Society will never be perfect.

Tim Dillon (1:54:21.060)

You have to be honest when you're ready to be honest

Lex Fridman (1:54:23.540)

or however you want to be honest,

Lex Fridman (1:54:25.120)

but it's not somebody, too much now

Lex Fridman (1:54:26.800)

is it's everyone else's fault that you didn't take,

Tim Dillon (1:54:29.860)

make a hard choice or a hard decision.

Lex Fridman (1:54:31.580)

So that's kind of what I took out of it.

Lex Fridman (1:54:33.700)

So now in retrospect, you see yourself as,

Lex Fridman (1:54:36.320)

were being afraid.

Lex Fridman (1:54:38.180)

Do you think at the time?

Lex Fridman (1:54:40.740)

Well, I wanted people to like me,

Lex Fridman (1:54:42.100)

which is the disease of humanity, right?

Lex Fridman (1:54:45.080)

Is that we want to be liked.

Lex Fridman (1:54:46.180)

And what happens is if you want people to like you

Lex Fridman (1:54:48.780)

and love you even,

Tim Dillon (1:54:49.660)

you want people to feel comfortable with you.

Lex Fridman (1:54:52.060)

And those were people like your family?

Tim Dillon (1:54:53.740)

Friends more.

Lex Fridman (1:54:55.140)

My family I would always,

Tim Dillon (1:54:56.380)

could always throw in the street,

Lex Fridman (1:54:57.940)

but I'm kidding.

Tim Dillon (1:54:59.580)

I mean, but I am not,

Lex Fridman (1:55:01.820)

but my friends, my circle of friends,

Tim Dillon (1:55:03.660)

which I were my family at the time when you're a senior,

Lex Fridman (1:55:06.820)

when you're 10th, 11th grade in high school,

Tim Dillon (1:55:08.380)

your friends are your family.

Lex Fridman (1:55:09.940)

You know what I mean?

Tim Dillon (1:55:10.780)

Like that's your,

Lex Fridman (1:55:11.680)

so you don't want to do anything

Tim Dillon (1:55:12.780)

that puts you on the outside of the circle.

Lex Fridman (1:55:15.260)

It's just thinking back to that fear.

Lex Fridman (1:55:16.760)

Is there things you're afraid of now?

Lex Fridman (1:55:19.360)

That you're not doing, you're afraid to do?

Tim Dillon (1:55:21.880)

I'm afraid of all kinds of things.

Lex Fridman (1:55:23.980)

I'm afraid of not being good at my job,

Tim Dillon (1:55:26.540)

not being funny, letting people down,

Lex Fridman (1:55:29.900)

not putting out products that are good,

Tim Dillon (1:55:33.220)

whether it's the podcast every week or stand up

Lex Fridman (1:55:36.020)

or the videos,

Tim Dillon (1:55:36.860)

like I'm afraid of like,

Lex Fridman (1:55:37.780)

there's a ton of people that really enjoy what we do.

Lex Fridman (1:55:40.160)

So when you're in that position,

Lex Fridman (1:55:41.620)

you're nervous that you're going to start doing things

Tim Dillon (1:55:44.540)

that they don't like.

Lex Fridman (1:55:45.380)

So the new things you want to do,

Tim Dillon (1:55:46.900)

the evolution you want to do,

Lex Fridman (1:55:48.500)

you want to make sure you're evolving in the right way.

Tim Dillon (1:55:51.060)

You want to make sure that you're doing things

Lex Fridman (1:55:52.460)

that are consistent with why people liked you,

Lex Fridman (1:55:54.540)

but also you don't want to put yourself in a box

Lex Fridman (1:55:56.660)

and limit what you can be going forward.

Lex Fridman (1:55:59.780)

So like, I had a talk with the CEO of NBC Universal once.

Lex Fridman (1:56:02.980)

I was doing some internal sketch for them.

Lex Fridman (1:56:05.740)

And I was playing like a cab driver and he was a,

Lex Fridman (1:56:08.660)

and he's not the current CEO, but he's a former CEO.

Lex Fridman (1:56:10.820)

And I said to him, what's the hardest part of running

Lex Fridman (1:56:12.700)

a corporation of this size?

Lex Fridman (1:56:14.820)

And he said something very interesting.

Lex Fridman (1:56:17.100)

He said, the hardest part is maximizing

Tim Dillon (1:56:18.980)

the current profit model of what you have

Lex Fridman (1:56:22.460)

at the same time, getting ready, getting ready,

Tim Dillon (1:56:25.220)

getting the company ready

Lex Fridman (1:56:26.140)

for where it's going to be in five years.

Tim Dillon (1:56:27.940)

He said, those are often at odds.

Lex Fridman (1:56:29.780)

And that's the toughest thing.

Tim Dillon (1:56:30.980)

He goes, cause I could just bang out

Lex Fridman (1:56:32.900)

everything I got to do right now.

Lex Fridman (1:56:34.100)

And we're going to make a lot of money doing this,

Lex Fridman (1:56:35.860)

but am I devoting enough resources into digital

Lex Fridman (1:56:37.900)

so that in five years, when that's where everything lives,

Lex Fridman (1:56:39.940)

are we competitive in that space?

Lex Fridman (1:56:42.220)

So as funny as I am now, hopefully to people

Lex Fridman (1:56:44.900)

and a lot of the things that I want to do now,

Tim Dillon (1:56:46.540)

I'm going, what am I, what groundwork am I not laying

Lex Fridman (1:56:49.900)

for three to five years down the road

Lex Fridman (1:56:52.060)

so that I can be adapting to the trends

Lex Fridman (1:56:55.620)

that are important then in terms of not so much

Tim Dillon (1:56:58.420)

comedic trends, but like the technological trends,

Lex Fridman (1:57:01.540)

like what is the, what is the, you know,

Tim Dillon (1:57:04.340)

I should have done podcasting earlier.

Lex Fridman (1:57:06.220)

What should I, should I have a bigger presence on TikTok?

Lex Fridman (1:57:09.100)

Should I have a bigger presence here?

Lex Fridman (1:57:10.220)

Should I have a business, or should I be on Twitch?

Lex Fridman (1:57:12.100)

Should I be doing this?

Lex Fridman (1:57:12.940)

Should I be doing that?

Lex Fridman (1:57:13.780)

What am I not doing that I should be doing

Lex Fridman (1:57:15.540)

that I'll regret not doing?

Lex Fridman (1:57:17.260)

And those are, those are the conversations

Lex Fridman (1:57:19.820)

I think I have in my own head all the time.

Lex Fridman (1:57:21.420)

And I guess there's parallels to coming out as gay

Lex Fridman (1:57:23.300)

or just parallels in like a career path

Lex Fridman (1:57:26.140)

so you're taking all that, that's ultimately just fear.

Lex Fridman (1:57:29.980)

It's fear. Yeah.

Tim Dillon (1:57:31.220)

It's the fear of, you know, the best thing that happened

Lex Fridman (1:57:34.620)

in my career was that I came to LA.

Tim Dillon (1:57:37.020)

I didn't have an idea of what was going to happen.

Lex Fridman (1:57:41.740)

I met somebody who was really committed

Tim Dillon (1:57:45.660)

to making funny things that we just wanted to be funny.

Lex Fridman (1:57:50.020)

No one would let us be funny.

Tim Dillon (1:57:51.220)

We didn't have Comedy Central letting us be funny.

Lex Fridman (1:57:53.860)

We didn't have HBO, we didn't have Netflix.

Tim Dillon (1:57:55.660)

We just had a garage and a phone in the beginning

Lex Fridman (1:57:58.100)

and then a camera and then a thing.

Lex Fridman (1:58:00.220)

And we just wanted to be funny.

Lex Fridman (1:58:01.700)

And that was the greatest risk really I took

Tim Dillon (1:58:03.980)

because I was like, well, I don't know what else

Lex Fridman (1:58:06.060)

is going to happen right now, but I just want to be funny.

Lex Fridman (1:58:08.640)

And funny saved my life, right?

Lex Fridman (1:58:10.180)

I mean, funny got me out of drugs.

Tim Dillon (1:58:11.580)

Funny probably got me out of the closet.

Lex Fridman (1:58:12.940)

Funny was the thing that I was able to do

Tim Dillon (1:58:14.960)

that made everything okay in my own head.

Lex Fridman (1:58:16.800)

So I was like, as long as I'm being funny,

Tim Dillon (1:58:18.120)

something good will happen.

Lex Fridman (1:58:19.020)

So we did that and then something really cool happened

Tim Dillon (1:58:21.700)

that we were able to do a lot of cool things,

Lex Fridman (1:58:23.740)

but that's what it is.

Tim Dillon (1:58:25.660)

It's fear that keeps you from being

Lex Fridman (1:58:27.520)

the better version of yourself.

Tim Dillon (1:58:29.340)

Your mom, I mean, you have so many complicated,

Lex Fridman (1:58:33.540)

fascinating parts of your story.

Tim Dillon (1:58:34.900)

Oh, thank you.

Lex Fridman (1:58:35.900)

Your mom, as you were growing up, suffered.

Tim Dillon (1:58:39.340)

Schizophrenic, yeah.

Lex Fridman (1:58:40.180)

Well, from mental illness, yeah, schizophrenia.

Lex Fridman (1:58:43.460)

Can you tell her story and how that relationship

Lex Fridman (1:58:45.780)

has changed over the years?

Tim Dillon (1:58:46.940)

Yeah, well, she was always eccentric and always,

Lex Fridman (1:58:49.700)

you know, the terms for schizophrenia

Tim Dillon (1:58:51.380)

in an Irish Catholic household

Lex Fridman (1:58:52.780)

where we didn't talk about anything were eccentric, fun.

Tim Dillon (1:58:56.180)

She's fun.

Lex Fridman (1:58:57.420)

There's a theme to this conversation.

Tim Dillon (1:58:58.260)

She's unpredictable.

Lex Fridman (1:58:59.860)

She's a wire, she was a live wire.

Tim Dillon (1:59:04.980)

Any of the words you would use to describe somebody

Lex Fridman (1:59:06.740)

who was a fucking lunatic, but you wouldn't say that.

Tim Dillon (1:59:11.660)

Pop that spin.

Lex Fridman (1:59:12.700)

Right, she started experiencing symptoms

Tim Dillon (1:59:17.060)

probably early on in her life,

Lex Fridman (1:59:18.260)

but she also, I think, started really manifesting them

Tim Dillon (1:59:22.620)

when I was in my mid teens, so like 14, 13, 14 area.

Lex Fridman (1:59:29.400)

And she got really, really bad.

Lex Fridman (1:59:30.980)

And then I think she was institutionalized

Lex Fridman (1:59:33.060)

about 10 years ago, a little over 10 years ago.

Lex Fridman (1:59:35.900)

And she could really no longer live on her own.

Lex Fridman (1:59:37.740)

She was unable to go to work.

Tim Dillon (1:59:39.520)

She was unable to function.

Lex Fridman (1:59:40.880)

So I visit her when I can.

Tim Dillon (1:59:42.060)

Obviously, I'm not in New York.

Lex Fridman (1:59:42.940)

Whenever I go to New York, I visit her.

Tim Dillon (1:59:44.420)

She's aware of what I do, my career and everything like that.

Lex Fridman (1:59:47.260)

She has good days and bad days,

Lex Fridman (1:59:48.380)

but mental illness is a thing that's very tough.

Lex Fridman (1:59:51.440)

We don't talk about it as a society.

Tim Dillon (1:59:53.180)

People with mental problems don't get that much attention.

Lex Fridman (1:59:57.220)

We tend to think that they did something wrong

Tim Dillon (20:00.800)

is that most of the YouTube algorithm

Lex Fridman (20:04.720)

is based on the title.

Tim Dillon (20:08.360)

That's crazy.

Lex Fridman (20:09.360)

And the description is a small contribution

Tim Dillon (20:11.560)

in terms of filtering,

Lex Fridman (20:12.520)

in terms of the knife fight situation.

Lex Fridman (20:14.800)

And that's all they can do.

Lex Fridman (20:17.080)

They don't have algorithms at all

Tim Dillon (20:19.520)

that are able to process the content of the video.

Lex Fridman (20:22.440)

So they try to also infer information

Tim Dillon (20:26.040)

based on if you're watching all of these QAnon videos

Lex Fridman (20:29.160)

or something like that, or Flat Earth videos,

Lex Fridman (20:32.240)

and you also watch, are really excitedly watching

Lex Fridman (20:35.800)

the whole knife fight in Malibu video,

Tim Dillon (20:39.320)

that says that increases the chance

Lex Fridman (20:42.320)

that the knife fight is a dangerous video for society

Tim Dillon (20:47.280)

or something like that.

Lex Fridman (20:48.120)

Interesting, wow.

Tim Dillon (20:48.960)

Based on their contribution.

Lex Fridman (20:49.800)

So people are watching something,

Tim Dillon (20:52.080)

because I watch QAnon and Flat Earth videos

Lex Fridman (20:54.280)

to ridicule them.

Tim Dillon (20:55.760)

Right.

Lex Fridman (20:56.600)

That, you know what I mean?

Tim Dillon (20:57.440)

I watch these videos and I make fun of them on my show.

Lex Fridman (20:59.960)

But what's interesting is,

Tim Dillon (21:00.800)

if I then go watch something else,

Lex Fridman (21:03.200)

I'm increasing the likelihood

Tim Dillon (21:04.560)

that that video is gonna get looked at

Lex Fridman (21:06.120)

as potentially subversive or dangerous.

Tim Dillon (21:07.920)

Exactly.

Lex Fridman (21:08.760)

That's why.

Lex Fridman (21:09.600)

So they make decisions about who you are,

Lex Fridman (21:12.040)

who you are as a human being,

Tim Dillon (21:13.400)

as a watcher, as a visual user,

Lex Fridman (21:15.000)

based on the clusters of videos you're in.

Lex Fridman (21:17.920)

But those clusters are not manually determined.

Lex Fridman (21:20.480)

They're automatically clustered.

Tim Dillon (21:23.200)

It's so weird.

Lex Fridman (21:24.600)

We have titles where they got upset about,

Tim Dillon (21:27.480)

I don't even understand.

Lex Fridman (21:29.200)

Like we had a title that was so innocuous, in my opinion,

Lex Fridman (21:32.800)

and the title of the episode was called Bomb Disney World.

Lex Fridman (21:36.120)

And I was asking people to consider bombing Disney World.

Lex Fridman (21:41.400)

And YouTube got angry at that.

Lex Fridman (21:43.920)

So you don't know why.

Tim Dillon (21:45.640)

You can never understand why.

Lex Fridman (21:46.960)

You could have said Disney World is the bombs.

Tim Dillon (21:48.720)

Right, right, right.

Lex Fridman (21:50.440)

It's just rearranging.

Tim Dillon (21:52.040)

That's what it probably meant.

Lex Fridman (21:52.880)

I wasn't saying do it,

Lex Fridman (21:53.720)

but I was saying let's start thinking about plans to do,

Lex Fridman (21:58.440)

not let's do it, but let's get in the mind.

Tim Dillon (22:01.800)

Let's change the conversation.

Lex Fridman (22:03.840)

I think it's very interesting because as a comedian,

Tim Dillon (22:05.880)

you don't wanna live in that world

Lex Fridman (22:06.920)

of worrying about algorithms.

Tim Dillon (22:08.000)

You don't wanna worry about deplatforming

Lex Fridman (22:09.320)

and shadowbanning.

Tim Dillon (22:10.160)

I mean, all these conversations

Lex Fridman (22:11.440)

that I've had with other comedians about shadowbanning,

Tim Dillon (22:13.480)

I mean, it's hilarious.

Lex Fridman (22:14.360)

We all call each other, I think I'm being shadowbanned.

Lex Fridman (22:16.720)

Are you being shadowbanned?

Lex Fridman (22:18.280)

Nobody knew what that word was a month ago,

Tim Dillon (22:20.640)

I mean, a year ago,

Lex Fridman (22:21.640)

but everyone now is convinced that everything they do

Tim Dillon (22:24.280)

that isn't succeeding is being shadowbanned.

Lex Fridman (22:26.880)

So it's this new paranoia,

Tim Dillon (22:30.000)

this algorithmic paranoia now that we all kinda have

Lex Fridman (22:33.240)

because there are genuine instances

Tim Dillon (22:36.560)

of people being taken out of an algorithm,

Lex Fridman (22:39.480)

you know, rightly or wrongly,

Tim Dillon (22:41.360)

however you wanna believe.

Lex Fridman (22:42.640)

But then there are also things that just don't perform

Tim Dillon (22:44.600)

as well for a myriad of reasons.

Lex Fridman (22:46.920)

And then we're all saying like, well, they're against me.

Tim Dillon (22:50.520)

They're shutting me down.

Lex Fridman (22:51.800)

And you don't know if that's true or not, you know?

Lex Fridman (22:54.920)

What do you think about this moment in history,

Lex Fridman (22:57.400)

which was really troubling to me?

Tim Dillon (23:01.000)

We could talk about several troubling aspects,

Lex Fridman (23:03.760)

but one is Amazon removing Parler from AWS.

Tim Dillon (23:09.440)

To me, that was the most clearly troubling.

Lex Fridman (23:13.640)

It felt like it created a more dangerous world

Tim Dillon (23:16.680)

when the infrastructure on which you have competing

Lex Fridman (23:23.080)

medium of communications now puts its finger on the scale,

Tim Dillon (23:26.920)

now influences who wins and who loses.

Lex Fridman (23:30.520)

Absolutely, you're right.

Lex Fridman (23:32.560)

And what you're always told is like,

Lex Fridman (23:35.120)

if you don't like Twitter, create your own service.

Tim Dillon (23:37.560)

Or if you don't like something, you can do your own thing.

Lex Fridman (23:40.000)

Or if you are, and basically because, you know, tech,

Tim Dillon (23:45.000)

you have to be in business with one of five companies.

Lex Fridman (23:46.880)

And I think it's like Amazon, Facebook, Google, YouTube,

Lex Fridman (23:50.240)

and Twitter, whatever, they're like, you know,

Lex Fridman (23:51.920)

I mean, Amazon puts everything on the cloud,

Tim Dillon (23:54.080)

you know, Google and YouTube,

Lex Fridman (23:55.120)

it's all basically the SEO and the advertising.

Lex Fridman (23:57.240)

And you got to get your name out there.

Lex Fridman (23:58.360)

You don't wanna be buried in it.

Tim Dillon (23:59.880)

Like, because you have to do business with it,

Lex Fridman (24:01.840)

it's a cartel of these companies.

Tim Dillon (24:03.440)

You understand it better than anybody

Lex Fridman (24:05.760)

that you are prevented, truly.

Lex Fridman (24:07.800)

And I think whatever you think about Parler,

Lex Fridman (24:10.760)

whatever you think about what people are saying on Parler,

Tim Dillon (24:12.920)

whatever you think about Alex Jones,

Lex Fridman (24:16.680)

whatever you thought about Milianopolis,

Tim Dillon (24:18.920)

the state has an interest in,

Lex Fridman (24:21.400)

and has always had an interest in crushing dissent.

Tim Dillon (24:25.360)

This is what the state has done.

Lex Fridman (24:26.920)

This is how they, you know, retain the power they have

Tim Dillon (24:31.760)

by eliminating dissent where they can.

Lex Fridman (24:34.400)

Now, because you don't have, you know,

Tim Dillon (24:36.280)

three broadcast networks anymore,

Lex Fridman (24:37.920)

and a handful of newspapers that were all run, by the way,

Tim Dillon (24:41.120)

by people that had been either compromised or happily,

Lex Fridman (24:45.880)

you know, happily going with the program,

Lex Fridman (24:48.520)

and you have this wild west of the internet,

Lex Fridman (24:51.560)

people like me, people that make,

Tim Dillon (24:54.320)

I make funny content that I hope is funny,

Lex Fridman (24:57.200)

but a lot of it is wild and crazy.

Tim Dillon (24:59.440)

I say a lot of wild and crazy things.

Lex Fridman (25:01.720)

They're very funny.

Tim Dillon (25:02.800)

I say a lot of wild and crazy things about powerful people.

Lex Fridman (25:05.920)

You mock the powerful in there

Tim Dillon (25:07.200)

by bringing them down a notch.

Lex Fridman (25:09.160)

We'll probably talk about it,

Lex Fridman (25:10.280)

but humor is one of the tools to balance the powers

Lex Fridman (25:16.200)

in society.

Tim Dillon (25:17.200)

Well, sure.

Lex Fridman (25:18.040)

And to make people feel better about things

Lex Fridman (25:19.800)

and to, you know, whatever the case may be, right?

Lex Fridman (25:22.440)

That's my goal is to kind of like,

Tim Dillon (25:23.840)

hey, people have had a shitty day.

Lex Fridman (25:25.560)

If this video or podcast makes you laugh, that's great.

Tim Dillon (25:29.280)

I think that it won't ever,

Lex Fridman (25:31.280)

it was never gonna stop at Alex Jones.

Tim Dillon (25:32.960)

Not that I think he should have been taking off everything

Lex Fridman (25:35.480)

the way he was,

Lex Fridman (25:36.560)

but this keeps going until we have sanitized

Lex Fridman (25:41.400)

all of social media.

Lex Fridman (25:42.560)

And what they really want it to be

Lex Fridman (25:44.880)

is what Instagram is kind of becoming,

Tim Dillon (25:46.600)

which is a marketplace of,

Lex Fridman (25:48.440)

you could just go and buy sneakers, go buy a sweatshirt,

Tim Dillon (25:51.080)

go buy jeans, go buy this, go buy that.

Lex Fridman (25:53.640)

And the idea of the free exchange of information

Tim Dillon (25:56.000)

seems to be the old internet.

Lex Fridman (25:58.280)

And it seems the new internet seems to be, you know,

Tim Dillon (26:01.800)

hyper, and I'm a capitalist,

Lex Fridman (26:03.400)

but this seems to be like hyper capitalist

Tim Dillon (26:05.000)

in the sense of like, they only want you consuming things

Lex Fridman (26:08.720)

and they don't want you thinking too much.

Lex Fridman (26:12.000)

And that seems to be where it's heading.

Lex Fridman (26:13.480)

I've even seen that with Instagram

Tim Dillon (26:14.840)

where it's like everything on Instagram is like,

Lex Fridman (26:16.600)

buy a sweatshirt, you know?

Lex Fridman (26:19.000)

And I'm like, all right, man.

Lex Fridman (26:21.000)

Hey man, if I want a sweatshirt, I'll get it.

Tim Dillon (26:23.080)

Like, relax.

Lex Fridman (26:25.040)

You know, just every ad seems to be encouraging consumption,

Lex Fridman (26:29.800)

but very few things seem geared towards,

Lex Fridman (26:33.760)

hey, let's have a dialogue or let's,

Lex Fridman (26:37.440)

and not that Instagram was ever great for that,

Lex Fridman (26:38.920)

but like, if everything's are geared now

Tim Dillon (26:40.520)

towards content on Instagram,

Lex Fridman (26:42.360)

a lot of it seems geared towards shopping.

Tim Dillon (26:44.800)

See, I don't know, that's an interesting point.

Lex Fridman (26:46.960)

I don't know if the consumerism that capitalism leads to

Tim Dillon (26:50.800)

is necessarily gets in the way of nuanced conversation.

Lex Fridman (26:53.760)

I feel like you could still sell Tim Dillon sweatshirts

Lex Fridman (26:57.160)

and have a difficult nuanced conversation

Lex Fridman (26:59.640)

or mock the current president, the previous president,

Tim Dillon (27:03.480)

mock the powerful, all that kind of stuff.

Lex Fridman (27:05.400)

Yeah, we try.

Tim Dillon (27:06.240)

We try to balance that.

Lex Fridman (27:07.080)

Do you have sweatshirts?

Tim Dillon (27:08.080)

We do.

Lex Fridman (27:09.720)

Are they on sale now, fake business?

Tim Dillon (27:12.440)

We do, fake business sweatshirt

Lex Fridman (27:14.080)

with the Enron logo, fake business,

Tim Dillon (27:15.400)

because I do fake business all the time.

Lex Fridman (27:17.240)

It would be nice if you talk about Alex Jones

Tim Dillon (27:18.800)

if you plug the sweatshirt during that conversation.

Lex Fridman (27:21.280)

Yeah, we'll do that, absolutely.

Lex Fridman (27:23.240)

But what I tend to worry about with,

Lex Fridman (27:26.120)

I see social media and technology

Tim Dillon (27:29.600)

existing to flatten society.

Lex Fridman (27:32.280)

It makes people very boring.

Tim Dillon (27:34.440)

All of the experiences kids have right now are online.

Lex Fridman (27:38.680)

Many of their closest friendships are online.

Tim Dillon (27:40.600)

Their first relationships are online.

Lex Fridman (27:42.920)

The culture is very homogenous,

Lex Fridman (27:45.640)

and I think it's eliminating characters.

Lex Fridman (27:47.960)

It's eliminating interesting people.

Tim Dillon (27:49.680)

It's making people into AI.

Lex Fridman (27:52.200)

All of their tastes.

Tim Dillon (27:53.040)

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

Lex Fridman (27:53.880)

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right.

Tim Dillon (27:54.720)

AI could be Charles Bukowski as well.

Lex Fridman (27:56.920)

Let's not get crazy.

Lex Fridman (27:57.880)

It's not there yet, right?

Lex Fridman (27:59.600)

I mean, the $75,000 dog is not doing anything.

Lex Fridman (28:03.720)

So we're not there yet.

Lex Fridman (28:06.360)

Listen, I hate people.

Tim Dillon (28:07.200)

I get why you like AI so much.

Lex Fridman (28:08.280)

I hate people too, and I'm very amenable to AI,

Lex Fridman (28:11.240)

and I agree with you.

Lex Fridman (28:12.920)

Listen, I think the future,

Tim Dillon (28:14.080)

we gotta get everyone out of here.

Lex Fridman (28:15.720)

I'm with you on that, so don't think I'm.

Tim Dillon (28:17.480)

I love people.

Lex Fridman (28:18.360)

He's manipulating my mind and my.

Tim Dillon (28:20.720)

That's why the flash of light in your eyes

Lex Fridman (28:22.800)

when you talked about that dog

Tim Dillon (28:24.360)

was so much more than any person.

Lex Fridman (28:27.120)

And I get it, by the way.

Tim Dillon (28:28.000)

You're right.

Lex Fridman (28:28.840)

I hate people, but if we could.

Tim Dillon (28:30.000)

They're not excited.

Lex Fridman (28:30.840)

If we could just use robots to kill most of them,

Tim Dillon (28:33.840)

I think that would be good for society.

Lex Fridman (28:35.880)

I'm with that too,

Lex Fridman (28:37.120)

but I think that social media flattens people.

Lex Fridman (28:40.520)

Flattening the personalities of characters.

Tim Dillon (28:42.320)

Flatten the personalities of people, man.

Lex Fridman (28:43.600)

And it's just, you know, when's the last time?

Tim Dillon (28:45.040)

Like, I like the idea of like, you know,

Lex Fridman (28:47.640)

and I'm, you know, somebody showing up to high school

Tim Dillon (28:51.240)

with like a backpack and taking out an old CD

Lex Fridman (28:53.000)

and being like, hey man, here's this band

Tim Dillon (28:54.560)

you've never heard of that I love

Lex Fridman (28:56.840)

or whatever, you gotta get into this.

Lex Fridman (28:58.280)

And I'm like, you know, when I talk to young,

Lex Fridman (29:00.120)

you know, I have friends that have younger brothers

Lex Fridman (29:01.360)

and everything.

Lex Fridman (29:02.480)

And I know that the dominant culture was always dominant.

Tim Dillon (29:04.760)

I'm not an idiot, but like,

Lex Fridman (29:05.880)

I feel like it's harder to be unique and original now

Tim Dillon (29:08.480)

because so much of what's promoted

Lex Fridman (29:12.000)

is just this way to kind of corral people

Tim Dillon (29:15.360)

into believing and thinking a certain set of ideals

Lex Fridman (29:18.700)

that's constantly shifting and evolving.

Lex Fridman (29:20.800)

And people are just caught up in that.

Lex Fridman (29:23.400)

And to me, it gets very boring very quickly.

Tim Dillon (29:27.280)

I hate being bored and that's what it is.

Lex Fridman (29:29.720)

I don't know what to do with that

Tim Dillon (29:30.640)

because at the same time, podcasts are really popular,

Lex Fridman (29:33.120)

long form podcasts are really popular

Lex Fridman (29:34.640)

and people are hungry for those kinds of conversations.

Lex Fridman (29:38.320)

There's a lot of dangerous ideas, quote unquote,

Tim Dillon (29:41.000)

flowing, being spread around through podcasts,

Lex Fridman (29:44.920)

meaning just like debates.

Tim Dillon (29:46.640)

Correct.

Lex Fridman (29:47.480)

You know, so that's still popular.

Lex Fridman (29:49.080)

So I don't know what to.

Lex Fridman (29:50.580)

I agree with you.

Tim Dillon (29:51.420)

That gives me hope, I guess.

Lex Fridman (29:52.440)

I hope so too.

Lex Fridman (29:53.280)

And like I said, I look at the negative a lot

Lex Fridman (29:55.360)

because that's what I usually make fun of,

Lex Fridman (29:57.200)

but there's a lot of positive stuff happening too.

Lex Fridman (2:00:00.340)

or that they deserve it or that they are to be ignored.

Lex Fridman (2:00:04.620)

And we don't devote a lot of resources into it,

Lex Fridman (2:00:06.500)

which is unfortunate because then you have the junk gurus

Tim Dillon (2:00:09.140)

come in and go like,

Lex Fridman (2:00:10.100)

let's diagnose your mental illness off Instagram.

Lex Fridman (2:00:12.500)

And it's like, that's not the move.

Lex Fridman (2:00:15.140)

Yeah.

Lex Fridman (2:00:15.980)

Do you love her?

Lex Fridman (2:00:17.500)

I do, I do.

Tim Dillon (2:00:19.220)

I love her, but I also remember her that isn't her now.

Lex Fridman (2:00:24.220)

And when someone has mental illness that's severe,

Tim Dillon (2:00:28.000)

you make peace with their death before they die.

Lex Fridman (2:00:31.180)

Wow, yeah.

Tim Dillon (2:00:32.080)

Because the part of them that you love and remember

Lex Fridman (2:00:36.340)

a lot of cases is not evident or obvious.

Tim Dillon (2:00:41.580)

Now, my mother's still a loving person that I love,

Lex Fridman (2:00:44.060)

but the fun, her ability to be present in the moment

Lex Fridman (2:00:49.540)

and to not, that is lost with the progression of realness

Lex Fridman (2:00:54.940)

so that you still love her.

Lex Fridman (2:00:56.260)

And I mean, again, your parents,

Lex Fridman (2:00:59.220)

the time horizons you have with your parents are unknown.

Tim Dillon (2:01:01.620)

People don't know.

Lex Fridman (2:01:02.460)

I have friends that their parents were in their lives

Tim Dillon (2:01:04.640)

for their entire life.

Lex Fridman (2:01:06.060)

And I have friends whose parents were in their life,

Lex Fridman (2:01:07.740)

but my mother was a very, she knew what I was.

Lex Fridman (2:01:10.020)

When I was a little kid, I was an actor.

Tim Dillon (2:01:11.340)

When I was like six to 12,

Lex Fridman (2:01:12.980)

my mother knew that I was a performer.

Tim Dillon (2:01:14.340)

She knew what I was and what I'd ultimately do.

Lex Fridman (2:01:16.320)

She recognized that in me.

Lex Fridman (2:01:17.540)

And when I said to her, I want to audition for shows,

Lex Fridman (2:01:19.280)

I want to be on stage, I want to be on this,

Tim Dillon (2:01:20.540)

I want to do this, she let me do it

Lex Fridman (2:01:22.980)

because she knew who I was

Lex Fridman (2:01:24.460)

and she didn't want to get in the way

Lex Fridman (2:01:25.900)

of me being a human being, a fully realized person at six.

Lex Fridman (2:01:30.660)

So that's probably the best thing a parent can do for a kid

Lex Fridman (2:01:33.400)

is let them be who they are.

Lex Fridman (2:01:35.900)

And my mother did that.

Lex Fridman (2:01:37.700)

So that, I mean, that's good.

Tim Dillon (2:01:40.300)

We ate too much fast food.

Lex Fridman (2:01:42.740)

There were negatives, but she did let me be who I was.

Tim Dillon (2:01:44.820)

That's why you want to throw them out into the street.

Lex Fridman (2:01:46.780)

Yeah, sometimes.

Lex Fridman (2:01:50.740)

But coming to accept the mortality of her,

Lex Fridman (2:01:57.520)

I guess, identity as you remember it from childhood,

Lex Fridman (2:02:00.980)

do you ponder your own mortality?

Lex Fridman (2:02:04.260)

Are you afraid of death?

Tim Dillon (2:02:06.100)

I'm afraid of death.

Lex Fridman (2:02:06.940)

I don't like the idea of death, but I know it's happening.

Tim Dillon (2:02:10.420)

I know it's going to happen eventually.

Lex Fridman (2:02:12.340)

I don't love it.

Lex Fridman (2:02:13.180)

Do you think about it?

Lex Fridman (2:02:14.140)

I think about, I want to do some good stuff

Tim Dillon (2:02:15.700)

that people can look back at.

Lex Fridman (2:02:16.900)

And I think I'm proud of the show

Tim Dillon (2:02:18.340)

where if people look back at the show,

Lex Fridman (2:02:19.820)

I don't know how comedy ages or whatever,

Lex Fridman (2:02:21.580)

but I think I put out a lot of stuff

Lex Fridman (2:02:23.420)

and I want to continue to put out stuff

Lex Fridman (2:02:24.780)

and I want to put out a few specials

Lex Fridman (2:02:26.060)

that people can look back at and go,

Tim Dillon (2:02:27.740)

oh, this guy was really funny in this really crazy,

Lex Fridman (2:02:30.520)

he lived in the latter part of this century

Tim Dillon (2:02:32.780)

when all this shit was going on.

Lex Fridman (2:02:33.920)

And he kind of made fun of it.

Lex Fridman (2:02:35.620)

And he did something to make people's lives a little better

Lex Fridman (2:02:40.660)

just by having a few laughs.

Lex Fridman (2:02:43.660)

What do you think about,

Lex Fridman (2:02:45.300)

this is something like in the podcast context,

Lex Fridman (2:02:48.460)

do you think you'll have just one or two or three shows

Lex Fridman (2:02:53.020)

out of thousands maybe that are like the truly special ones?

Tim Dillon (2:02:56.940)

That's probably the case.

Lex Fridman (2:02:57.900)

Or do you think it's an entirety of the body of work?

Tim Dillon (2:03:00.700)

I think people will take 10 minute clips

Lex Fridman (2:03:02.900)

from all different shows and put them together.

Lex Fridman (2:03:05.380)

And there's a highlight.

Lex Fridman (2:03:06.300)

Yeah, like a highlight reel of just like,

Tim Dillon (2:03:08.000)

these are like the best things that he's ever done

Lex Fridman (2:03:10.900)

or the best rants he's ever had,

Tim Dillon (2:03:12.340)

the best things, whatever.

Lex Fridman (2:03:13.420)

So the legacy would be that this was an important voice

Tim Dillon (2:03:16.980)

in a very weird time.

Lex Fridman (2:03:18.900)

I would hope that that's part of it.

Lex Fridman (2:03:21.580)

And I hope that I continue to be,

Lex Fridman (2:03:24.020)

you say important, I say funny,

Lex Fridman (2:03:25.860)

but hopefully I continue to be a voice.

Lex Fridman (2:03:28.380)

And that's what I think when I think about death,

Lex Fridman (2:03:30.460)

I think about like, what do people come on earth to do?

Lex Fridman (2:03:33.420)

And I think I came,

Tim Dillon (2:03:34.500)

I think my main purpose on this planet

Lex Fridman (2:03:37.260)

other than to experience whatever love

Tim Dillon (2:03:39.940)

or worthiness or whatever is to entertain people.

Lex Fridman (2:03:44.580)

And there's a lot of people in comedy right now

Tim Dillon (2:03:46.180)

that are not entertainers, and that's really the problem.

Lex Fridman (2:03:49.780)

But, and they got into comedy sort of the way

Tim Dillon (2:03:51.660)

that you can walk into the wrong store in a mall

Lex Fridman (2:03:55.420)

and then not realize you're in the wrong store

Lex Fridman (2:03:57.500)

and try on a bunch of clothes and then go,

Lex Fridman (2:03:58.800)

fuck, I wasted my whole afternoon.

Lex Fridman (2:04:00.940)

But I think I've always kind of been an entertainer

Lex Fridman (2:04:02.720)

and that's what I wanna do.

Tim Dillon (2:04:04.140)

There's a, unfortunately, sadly,

Lex Fridman (2:04:07.020)

a lot of people that look up to you.

Tim Dillon (2:04:08.940)

That is a horrible thing, but life is a nightmare.

Lex Fridman (2:04:12.360)

Yeah.

Tim Dillon (2:04:14.420)

If you were to give them advice,

Lex Fridman (2:04:16.780)

young folks, people in college, maybe even high school,

Lex Fridman (2:04:20.320)

but people in their 20s about what to do with their life,

Lex Fridman (2:04:24.460)

whether it's career, whether it's just life in general,

Lex Fridman (2:04:27.120)

what would you say?

Lex Fridman (2:04:27.960)

Ignore everyone.

Tim Dillon (2:04:29.580)

Make a few good friends.

Lex Fridman (2:04:32.540)

Truly have honest conversations with yourself about your,

Lex Fridman (2:04:39.060)

when do you feel the most alive?

Lex Fridman (2:04:42.500)

Figure that out.

Lex Fridman (2:04:44.340)

When and how do you feel the most alive?

Lex Fridman (2:04:47.220)

Yeah.

Tim Dillon (2:04:48.340)

Figure that out.

Lex Fridman (2:04:50.300)

Try to figure out a job or a career

Tim Dillon (2:04:52.180)

that can replicate that feeling.

Lex Fridman (2:04:56.240)

Don't listen to anyone.

Tim Dillon (2:04:57.460)

Don't listen to your parents.

Lex Fridman (2:04:58.860)

Don't listen to the gurus on the internet.

Tim Dillon (2:05:01.140)

Don't listen to me.

Lex Fridman (2:05:02.540)

Don't listen to anyone.

Tim Dillon (2:05:03.780)

Figure out where you feel the most alive.

Lex Fridman (2:05:07.500)

Where do you feel excited?

Lex Fridman (2:05:09.100)

Where does your pulse quicken?

Lex Fridman (2:05:11.460)

What do you feel matters?

Lex Fridman (2:05:13.640)

When you're in a situation, do you feel like it matters?

Lex Fridman (2:05:17.260)

What situation was that?

Lex Fridman (2:05:18.580)

What got you excited?

Lex Fridman (2:05:20.460)

What thing did you walk into where you looked around

Lex Fridman (2:05:24.440)

and were taken back and you're like,

Lex Fridman (2:05:25.800)

wow, this is amazing?

Lex Fridman (2:05:27.180)

And I'm filled with awe.

Lex Fridman (2:05:28.980)

If you can figure out a life where you can excite yourself,

Tim Dillon (2:05:34.040)

you might not use drugs or alcohol or a sex addiction

Lex Fridman (2:05:37.980)

or gambling or irresponsibility.

Tim Dillon (2:05:41.100)

You might not have to get your fucking kicks

Lex Fridman (2:05:44.140)

in very destructive places

Tim Dillon (2:05:46.440)

if you can get them in a productive place.

Lex Fridman (2:05:48.900)

Well, you had a pretty weaving life

Tim Dillon (2:05:53.020)

that's full of mistakes and so on.

Lex Fridman (2:05:56.860)

Many mistakes.

Lex Fridman (2:05:59.700)

Is that, are mistakes a bug or a feature?

Lex Fridman (2:06:02.220)

Like, do you recommend embrace the mistakes,

Lex Fridman (2:06:05.220)

make a bunch of them?

Lex Fridman (2:06:06.060)

Depends what they are, right?

Tim Dillon (2:06:07.500)

So.

Lex Fridman (2:06:08.340)

Well, you've had the full spectrum.

Tim Dillon (2:06:09.900)

I've had a lot, but a lot of mine could have sunk me.

Lex Fridman (2:06:12.640)

Right.

Tim Dillon (2:06:13.480)

Like, they sound like fun when I talk about them,

Lex Fridman (2:06:15.240)

but they actually could have sunk me.

Lex Fridman (2:06:17.740)

And they were all part of what made me funny,

Lex Fridman (2:06:21.380)

but I don't know.

Tim Dillon (2:06:22.860)

I would never tell anyone else

Lex Fridman (2:06:25.020)

to just light their life on fire

Lex Fridman (2:06:26.780)

and hope it all works out on the other end.

Lex Fridman (2:06:28.620)

It would be pretty irresponsible.

Lex Fridman (2:06:30.760)

But hey, at the end of the day, it's like,

Lex Fridman (2:06:34.700)

you're gonna, we get, there's, you know,

Tim Dillon (2:06:39.080)

I think one of my themes is that there's too much.

Lex Fridman (2:06:41.660)

We give the power.

Tim Dillon (2:06:42.780)

We think we have too, the power of choice

Lex Fridman (2:06:46.180)

has been elevated on our society to an unhealthy degree.

Tim Dillon (2:06:50.420)

I think people are, I think you could get really good

Lex Fridman (2:06:53.500)

at something, but you're born with a certain aptitude.

Tim Dillon (2:06:55.980)

It might be to be a deal maker,

Lex Fridman (2:06:57.720)

might be to be an athlete.

Tim Dillon (2:06:58.860)

It might be to be an artist.

Lex Fridman (2:06:59.940)

It might be to be a romantic,

Tim Dillon (2:07:01.660)

just fall in and out of love, in and out of love,

Lex Fridman (2:07:03.240)

in and out of love.

Tim Dillon (2:07:04.080)

It might be to be like a world traveler.

Lex Fridman (2:07:05.420)

Like, but whatever you are, I think you are.

Tim Dillon (2:07:08.780)

I think that there's something about you

Lex Fridman (2:07:10.380)

that makes you something.

Lex Fridman (2:07:11.980)

And if you can figure it out and then refine,

Lex Fridman (2:07:13.700)

you're not gonna be good at it per se.

Lex Fridman (2:07:15.780)

But if you're an athlete,

Lex Fridman (2:07:17.660)

it might not mean that you're going to be a great athlete

Tim Dillon (2:07:20.020)

in the history, but it might mean you're the best coach

Lex Fridman (2:07:22.020)

anyone's ever had, or you're the person that, you know,

Tim Dillon (2:07:24.580)

builds a local scene for young athletes or whatever.

Lex Fridman (2:07:27.460)

If you are a really good deal maker,

Tim Dillon (2:07:30.100)

it doesn't mean you're gonna be Warren Buffett,

Lex Fridman (2:07:31.460)

but it might mean you're somebody who enjoys

Tim Dillon (2:07:33.920)

making deals all the time and things like that.

Lex Fridman (2:07:36.520)

Like if you're an entertainer,

Tim Dillon (2:07:38.220)

it might mean that you are an entertainer.

Lex Fridman (2:07:40.900)

It might mean that you are in the world of entertainment

Tim Dillon (2:07:43.220)

because you love it so much that if you lack the skillset

Lex Fridman (2:07:46.820)

to really pursue it on a degree,

Tim Dillon (2:07:49.060)

you just want to be like, there's a thing

Lex Fridman (2:07:51.820)

inside of you that makes you what you are.

Tim Dillon (2:07:55.380)

I think, I look at certain people and I go,

Lex Fridman (2:07:56.980)

you were born to be that thing.

Lex Fridman (2:07:59.220)

You know?

Lex Fridman (2:08:00.060)

The whole purpose is to find it.

Tim Dillon (2:08:01.260)

I was a juror on that murder trial in Long Island

Lex Fridman (2:08:03.980)

and the woman who's the DA, I'm like,

Tim Dillon (2:08:05.940)

you were born to do this.

Lex Fridman (2:08:07.280)

You were born to put murderers away

Lex Fridman (2:08:10.220)

and this guy killed the mother of his children.

Lex Fridman (2:08:12.340)

I mean, he's a bad guy, but like, I was like,

Tim Dillon (2:08:13.660)

you are really good at what you do.

Lex Fridman (2:08:15.580)

She has a strong belief in whatever her moral code is

Lex Fridman (2:08:18.580)

and what her justice and ethics are.

Lex Fridman (2:08:20.500)

And she wants to communicate that to people.

Tim Dillon (2:08:22.100)

She was very good at doing what she did.

Lex Fridman (2:08:25.820)

I don't know the facts of the case.

Tim Dillon (2:08:26.980)

I didn't really listen.

Lex Fridman (2:08:27.820)

He seemed guilty, so I just voted guilty.

Lex Fridman (2:08:29.640)

But I didn't really listen to her,

Lex Fridman (2:08:31.900)

but I heard the shape of her mouth was very bovine,

Tim Dillon (2:08:34.260)

like a cow, and it conferred a certain level

Lex Fridman (2:08:36.860)

of expertise that I enjoyed.

Tim Dillon (2:08:39.100)

Well, it's funny.

Lex Fridman (2:08:39.940)

I mean, you could see, you're half joking.

Tim Dillon (2:08:42.980)

Yes, but I'm serious.

Lex Fridman (2:08:43.820)

You can often see that people just,

Tim Dillon (2:08:46.780)

they found their place.

Lex Fridman (2:08:47.860)

They found their role.

Tim Dillon (2:08:48.820)

They found their thing.

Lex Fridman (2:08:49.700)

They found their thing,

Lex Fridman (2:08:50.540)

and that's kind of the purpose of life.

Lex Fridman (2:08:52.060)

And once you are in a place that seems sticky,

Tim Dillon (2:08:55.780)

like the place that seems right,

Lex Fridman (2:08:59.380)

that's one of the problems with the generation

Tim Dillon (2:09:01.140)

that you're speaking to, is there's always a feeling

Lex Fridman (2:09:03.380)

like I should keep exploring, keep exploring.

Lex Fridman (2:09:05.620)

But it's okay to stay in a place that you found that works.

Lex Fridman (2:09:08.980)

Yeah, and listen, sometimes the best place you'll find

Tim Dillon (2:09:12.020)

is like when people are like,

Lex Fridman (2:09:13.940)

when did you feel really excited and alive?

Tim Dillon (2:09:15.900)

It's like doing nothing.

Lex Fridman (2:09:18.020)

Right, yeah.

Tim Dillon (2:09:19.220)

You know, like that's the other thing.

Lex Fridman (2:09:20.940)

It's like some people are gonna be like,

Tim Dillon (2:09:22.020)

I feel really excited and alive,

Lex Fridman (2:09:23.540)

and I'm laying in my backyard in a hammock.

Lex Fridman (2:09:25.860)

And I just wanted the simplest life

Lex Fridman (2:09:27.460)

and not have to do much, and I don't like doing anything.

Lex Fridman (2:09:30.220)

And I love laying around and going,

Lex Fridman (2:09:31.620)

wow, the sky looks good today.

Tim Dillon (2:09:33.580)

Bill Gates goes, the sky looks good today.

Lex Fridman (2:09:34.940)

Let's shoot a missile into it.

Lex Fridman (2:09:36.300)

He wants to do shit, right?

Lex Fridman (2:09:37.540)

So it's like in between that and nothing

Tim Dillon (2:09:40.180)

is you can find something.

Lex Fridman (2:09:42.020)

But in that process, for you personally,

Tim Dillon (2:09:45.620)

I mean, for me and for others, I think there's a struggle.

Lex Fridman (2:09:49.500)

When you look in the,

Tim Dillon (2:09:50.340)

when Tim and Dylan looks in the mirror,

Lex Fridman (2:09:52.140)

do you love yourself or do you hate yourself?

Tim Dillon (2:09:54.820)

Well, a lot of times I think I'm Amy Schumer,

Lex Fridman (2:09:56.740)

so I'm confused.

Tim Dillon (2:09:59.900)

I'm a detente to myself all the time.

Lex Fridman (2:10:01.860)

I don't love myself or hate myself.

Tim Dillon (2:10:03.100)

Addicts have a very bad problem

Lex Fridman (2:10:06.940)

where you can't just fall in love with yourself

Lex Fridman (2:10:09.180)

and you can't hate yourself.

Lex Fridman (2:10:10.460)

Both of them lead you to a negative place.

Tim Dillon (2:10:12.700)

You try to stay kind of even keel.

Lex Fridman (2:10:14.780)

I don't go like, hey man, you put out a video,

Tim Dillon (2:10:17.300)

get all these views, things are great.

Lex Fridman (2:10:18.740)

You sold a bunch of tickets.

Tim Dillon (2:10:19.820)

Let's fucking go out and like, maybe let's,

Lex Fridman (2:10:21.740)

hey man, let's have that drink

Tim Dillon (2:10:23.060)

that you've been waiting for for 11 years.

Lex Fridman (2:10:24.980)

And I don't look at myself and go,

Tim Dillon (2:10:26.380)

you ate a burger yesterday.

Lex Fridman (2:10:27.580)

You're a piece of shit.

Tim Dillon (2:10:28.580)

You're horrible.

Lex Fridman (2:10:29.780)

You'll never get into the shape you want.

Tim Dillon (2:10:33.260)

I try not to get too low or too high.

Lex Fridman (2:10:35.100)

Both of them are not good for my particular mind.

Tim Dillon (2:10:38.740)

Okay, I gotta ask, we kind of spoke about 2021

Lex Fridman (2:10:42.900)

and you being potentially hopeful,

Tim Dillon (2:10:45.180)

hopeful short term, cynical long term.

Lex Fridman (2:10:48.740)

Yeah.

Lex Fridman (2:10:49.940)

So let me ask, I forgot to ask, are you moving to Austin?

Lex Fridman (2:10:54.180)

I don't know.

Tim Dillon (2:10:55.020)

I mean, I don't think so immediately.

Lex Fridman (2:10:57.540)

I love Joe.

Tim Dillon (2:10:58.380)

I love what he's trying to do down there.

Lex Fridman (2:10:59.820)

I'm appreciative of everything that he's done

Tim Dillon (2:11:02.260)

for not only me, but for comedy in general.

Lex Fridman (2:11:04.660)

And I think as things happen in Austin

Lex Fridman (2:11:06.580)

and unfold is such a political answer,

Lex Fridman (2:11:08.580)

but as things unfold, I will consider it more and more.

Lex Fridman (2:11:11.340)

But I mean, I think I got another year in LA.

Lex Fridman (2:11:14.460)

So you've spoken so nicely about this magical place

Tim Dillon (2:11:18.660)

that is Los Angeles.

Lex Fridman (2:11:20.020)

LA is very funny.

Lex Fridman (2:11:22.220)

You think there's a place for comedy in LA?

Lex Fridman (2:11:24.460)

Oh yeah.

Tim Dillon (2:11:25.860)

There will always be a place for comedy in LA.

Lex Fridman (2:11:27.380)

So it's gonna be a place for comedy in New York.

Tim Dillon (2:11:29.740)

I mean, the question is how thriving of a comedy scene

Lex Fridman (2:11:32.340)

is Austin gonna be?

Lex Fridman (2:11:33.620)

And Joe can probably make it one,

Lex Fridman (2:11:36.820)

but as of right now, it isn't.

Lex Fridman (2:11:38.620)

So that would be him doing that.

Lex Fridman (2:11:39.980)

But the question, there's a lot of people escaping

Tim Dillon (2:11:42.300)

Los Angeles, but I know better about New York.

Lex Fridman (2:11:44.780)

There's a lot of really brilliant people.

Tim Dillon (2:11:46.620)

Let them go.

Lex Fridman (2:11:47.460)

There's other people.

Tim Dillon (2:11:48.700)

This is the thing.

Lex Fridman (2:11:49.540)

It's like, this is the fear thing.

Tim Dillon (2:11:50.700)

It's like, no, but all the brilliant people are leaving.

Lex Fridman (2:11:53.100)

There'll be other people and they'll fill their shoes

Tim Dillon (2:11:55.420)

the way that they've done throughout history.

Lex Fridman (2:11:57.700)

And I think that New York and LA,

Tim Dillon (2:11:59.540)

listen, maybe in five to 10 years,

Lex Fridman (2:12:00.900)

they're not the two cities.

Tim Dillon (2:12:02.380)

It would be real rough in five years

Lex Fridman (2:12:05.220)

when this pandemic's over for people in Australia to go,

Tim Dillon (2:12:08.460)

dude, you gotta go to America

Lex Fridman (2:12:10.420)

and you gotta visit Charleston and Austin.

Tim Dillon (2:12:13.220)

Stop.

Lex Fridman (2:12:14.060)

Let's be adults here.

Tim Dillon (2:12:15.180)

Let's be adults.

Lex Fridman (2:12:16.260)

It's still gonna be New York and LA for a while.

Tim Dillon (2:12:18.700)

LA is an absolute hellscape,

Lex Fridman (2:12:21.940)

but I don't think you're gonna replace California

Tim Dillon (2:12:26.460)

with another place.

Lex Fridman (2:12:28.980)

And also, everyone's making decisions now

Tim Dillon (2:12:30.660)

because we're literally in the midst of a pandemic

Lex Fridman (2:12:32.460)

we've never had before.

Tim Dillon (2:12:34.060)

We've never had this before.

Lex Fridman (2:12:35.500)

Joe loved California up until the pandemic.

Tim Dillon (2:12:37.940)

He had problems with it.

Lex Fridman (2:12:39.220)

Like, we all have problems with it.

Tim Dillon (2:12:40.660)

There's a lot of benefits to being here.

Lex Fridman (2:12:42.420)

I think a lot of us made pretty bad decisions in 2020

Tim Dillon (2:12:45.580)

because we were all locked up

Lex Fridman (2:12:46.860)

and stuck with our own thoughts.

Tim Dillon (2:12:48.940)

But, so it's funny, there's parallels

Lex Fridman (2:12:52.060)

because I don't necessarily,

Tim Dillon (2:12:54.260)

you know, I'm obviously a fan of comedy,

Lex Fridman (2:12:55.940)

but I don't care where comics move.

Lex Fridman (2:12:59.060)

But there's a parallel move that's happening,

Lex Fridman (2:13:01.300)

set of decisions which do influence my decision making,

Tim Dillon (2:13:04.380)

which is where to start a business that's tech centered.

Lex Fridman (2:13:07.700)

And that's more about the San Francisco, Silicon Valley.

Lex Fridman (2:13:12.180)

And there is a lot of people leaving there.

Lex Fridman (2:13:15.180)

That's already.

Lex Fridman (2:13:16.020)

And they're going to Austin.

Lex Fridman (2:13:16.860)

Well, Austin, there's a, I think,

Tim Dillon (2:13:19.900)

there's a bunch of different places.

Lex Fridman (2:13:21.340)

Phoenix, there's Denver.

Tim Dillon (2:13:23.380)

Austin will probably be a massive tech hub.

Lex Fridman (2:13:26.780)

Elon's there.

Tim Dillon (2:13:27.660)

It seems like it's all, everything about Austin says

Lex Fridman (2:13:30.700)

that it's going to be a massive tech hub.

Tim Dillon (2:13:33.220)

I just don't know if that means

Lex Fridman (2:13:34.220)

it'll be a massive comedy hub.

Tim Dillon (2:13:35.580)

It might.

Lex Fridman (2:13:36.420)

I don't know if those two can actually coexist.

Tim Dillon (2:13:38.420)

It's interesting because.

Lex Fridman (2:13:39.620)

Yeah, I don't, I think, you know,

Tim Dillon (2:13:41.620)

comedy suffered in New York and LA

Lex Fridman (2:13:43.060)

when everyone got super rich.

Tim Dillon (2:13:45.380)

Like, you know, it just wasn't as cool.

Lex Fridman (2:13:47.100)

It's still much more fun on the road.

Tim Dillon (2:13:48.980)

It's still more fun to perform for people

Lex Fridman (2:13:50.540)

that want and need to laugh in strip malls

Tim Dillon (2:13:53.420)

than it is to perform for hedge fund managers

Lex Fridman (2:13:55.740)

and with their dates and, you know, Instagram models in LA.

Tim Dillon (2:13:59.220)

It's just what it is.

Lex Fridman (2:14:00.060)

Comedy on the road is much more fun.

Lex Fridman (2:14:01.700)

So maybe in the spirit of that, Austin becomes,

Lex Fridman (2:14:04.380)

but you know, you know, if Austin is just colonized

Tim Dillon (2:14:06.940)

by tech bros and stuff like, yeah, I mean,

Lex Fridman (2:14:08.900)

sure, sure it'll be fun and it'll be great.

Tim Dillon (2:14:10.700)

I think Joe's made LA a scene.

Lex Fridman (2:14:13.740)

So if anyone's going to make Austin a scene, it's Joe.

Tim Dillon (2:14:17.660)

Yeah, and I like the, on the Elon side,

Lex Fridman (2:14:20.060)

which is what I'm much more familiar with,

Tim Dillon (2:14:22.260)

the promise of the possibility of what that could become

Lex Fridman (2:14:25.540)

because there's a lot of problems in Silicon Valley.

Lex Fridman (2:14:27.700)

And of course it might be naive to think that

Lex Fridman (2:14:30.380)

just because it's like the grass is greener thing,

Tim Dillon (2:14:33.060)

which is just because the place where you come from

Lex Fridman (2:14:36.220)

has a lot of problems,

Tim Dillon (2:14:37.420)

doesn't mean you can just create a new place

Lex Fridman (2:14:39.140)

that's not going to have those problems.

Tim Dillon (2:14:39.980)

Yeah, there's homelessness in Austin.

Lex Fridman (2:14:41.580)

There are problems in Austin.

Tim Dillon (2:14:42.860)

I mean, I think that with, by the way,

Lex Fridman (2:14:44.860)

with the influx of very rich people to an area,

Tim Dillon (2:14:48.140)

sometimes that helps things,

Lex Fridman (2:14:49.180)

but sometimes it just makes things more polarizing

Lex Fridman (2:14:51.260)

and it puts a spotlight on those problems

Lex Fridman (2:14:53.460)

and makes those problems even bigger, right?

Tim Dillon (2:14:55.180)

So, I mean, I don't know that it's necessarily,

Lex Fridman (2:14:58.060)

it's hard to predict.

Tim Dillon (2:14:59.180)

I just know that LA right now is funny.

Lex Fridman (2:15:01.060)

It's funny that there's 15 year old TikTokers

Tim Dillon (2:15:03.020)

making millions of dollars dancing in a house

Lex Fridman (2:15:05.260)

while the world burns.

Tim Dillon (2:15:06.420)

That is very funny.

Lex Fridman (2:15:07.340)

Well, it's for your style of humor, yes.

Tim Dillon (2:15:11.140)

The absurdity of the world is that it's...

Lex Fridman (2:15:13.220)

No one cares about Hollywood starlets

Lex Fridman (2:15:15.380)

and actresses and actors and everyone goes,

Lex Fridman (2:15:16.900)

hey, fuck you.

Tim Dillon (2:15:17.740)

Even though they've won three Academy Awards,

Lex Fridman (2:15:19.580)

they're all being replaced

Tim Dillon (2:15:20.700)

by just mediocre dancer 15 year olds.

Lex Fridman (2:15:23.980)

I mean, it's like there's something hilarious

Tim Dillon (2:15:25.500)

about this city and it will burn in hell,

Lex Fridman (2:15:28.580)

but so will everything.

Lex Fridman (2:15:29.660)

So what are we talking about?

Lex Fridman (2:15:31.980)

Eventually the sun will die out

Lex Fridman (2:15:34.620)

and we will all be gone unless we colonize

Lex Fridman (2:15:37.420)

outside of our solar system.

Lex Fridman (2:15:38.980)

But I just sit here,

Lex Fridman (2:15:42.900)

I'm struggling with this

Tim Dillon (2:15:43.900)

because Boston, I'm currently at MIT,

Lex Fridman (2:15:46.540)

Boston doesn't feel like the right place

Tim Dillon (2:15:48.180)

to start a business in the tech sector.

Lex Fridman (2:15:52.700)

And so I'm choosing,

Tim Dillon (2:15:53.540)

I'm looking at San Francisco the way it is

Lex Fridman (2:15:55.500)

and I'm looking at Austin.

Tim Dillon (2:15:56.820)

Oh, Austin, clearly.

Lex Fridman (2:15:58.340)

So it seems clear, but it's such a difficult thing

Tim Dillon (2:16:02.900)

to predict what a place will look like in 10 years

Lex Fridman (2:16:07.500)

and 15 years and 20 years.

Lex Fridman (2:16:08.980)

And it's so hard to predict if you'll like it or not

Lex Fridman (2:16:10.940)

until you're there.

Lex Fridman (2:16:12.060)

And this is speaking to risk,

Lex Fridman (2:16:15.140)

there's not really a good reason for me to move anywhere.

Tim Dillon (2:16:18.180)

There's not a good reason to do anything in life.

Lex Fridman (2:16:21.180)

Part of me wants to just fucking do it

Lex Fridman (2:16:25.100)

and whatever and see what happens.

Lex Fridman (2:16:26.340)

Do you like Boston, do you like other things about Boston

Lex Fridman (2:16:28.380)

besides the tech thing?

Lex Fridman (2:16:30.780)

You like MIT.

Tim Dillon (2:16:31.940)

MIT, that's the problem.

Lex Fridman (2:16:33.260)

Do you like the food in Boston?

Lex Fridman (2:16:35.300)

Do you eat food?

Lex Fridman (2:16:36.140)

I haven't eaten food or been outside for years.

Lex Fridman (2:16:39.620)

And I mean, that's probably the better version.

Lex Fridman (2:16:42.900)

But you're keto forever.

Tim Dillon (2:16:44.540)

You've been keto for a long time.

Lex Fridman (2:16:45.940)

Yeah, keto, fasting for a long time.

Tim Dillon (2:16:49.020)

15 years fasting, eating once or twice a day.

Lex Fridman (2:16:54.020)

But no sugar ever, no like and no pasta ever, no bread ever.

Tim Dillon (2:17:00.180)

No pasta, no bread, no, except like, so my source of...

Lex Fridman (2:17:05.180)

You could kind of live anywhere

Tim Dillon (2:17:06.420)

because like going out is such a big part

Lex Fridman (2:17:09.060)

of what city you live in.

Lex Fridman (2:17:10.180)

And like, do you like the food there?

Lex Fridman (2:17:11.460)

Do you like the restaurants?

Lex Fridman (2:17:12.300)

Can you meet people?

Lex Fridman (2:17:13.140)

Whatever, but it's like, you really can just kind of...

Tim Dillon (2:17:15.580)

Yeah, so not married, no kids.

Lex Fridman (2:17:17.420)

Right, you have freedom.

Tim Dillon (2:17:18.340)

Me too, I have freedom.

Lex Fridman (2:17:20.580)

And that's, we have the curse of being vegan.

Tim Dillon (2:17:23.980)

We have too many choices.

Lex Fridman (2:17:25.580)

Right.

Tim Dillon (2:17:26.420)

That's the thing.

Lex Fridman (2:17:27.260)

We have too many choices.

Tim Dillon (2:17:28.100)

We don't have somebody else going, what about like,

Lex Fridman (2:17:29.620)

we don't have to justify our decisions to anyone.

Lex Fridman (2:17:31.860)

So we can just kind of like let our minds go run wild.

Lex Fridman (2:17:34.540)

So you just got to hone the instinct

Tim Dillon (2:17:37.500)

of just what feels right and just fucking do it.

Lex Fridman (2:17:40.940)

And that's it.

Tim Dillon (2:17:41.780)

I think Austin with Joe down there and Elon down there,

Lex Fridman (2:17:42.940)

Austin seems like a real no brainer move for you.

Lex Fridman (2:17:46.460)

To try, you know, why the hell not?

Lex Fridman (2:17:48.540)

Why not?

Lex Fridman (2:17:49.620)

And then I think I should go to MIT.

Lex Fridman (2:17:51.420)

Like, I mean, I think I should give those nerds

Tim Dillon (2:17:56.940)

a piece of my mind that you should go to.

Lex Fridman (2:17:59.580)

I was in an Uber pool once with a kid from MIT

Lex Fridman (2:18:02.580)

and I was eating this thing from Bova's Bakery.

Lex Fridman (2:18:05.100)

I forget what it was.

Tim Dillon (2:18:06.020)

It was like a, it's so good.

Lex Fridman (2:18:08.700)

I don't know.

Lex Fridman (2:18:09.540)

You don't know Bova's Bakery, right?

Lex Fridman (2:18:10.660)

Yeah, it's in Boston, it's famous.

Tim Dillon (2:18:12.260)

I was eating a thing and I was like covered in chocolate.

Lex Fridman (2:18:14.220)

This kid, like this little nerd, like this little like,

Tim Dillon (2:18:16.140)

you know, USB drive with feet was just staring at me

Lex Fridman (2:18:19.180)

and they just dropped him off at MIT.

Lex Fridman (2:18:21.180)

And he like scurried away.

Lex Fridman (2:18:22.740)

But that's a big school that,

Tim Dillon (2:18:23.860)

doesn't the NSA recruit out of their heavy,

Lex Fridman (2:18:25.740)

like MIT, places like that?

Tim Dillon (2:18:27.740)

I can't, I can't speak to that.

Lex Fridman (2:18:30.420)

But what, this is a ridiculous question

Tim Dillon (2:18:34.540)

I sometimes ask myself when I'm alone.

Lex Fridman (2:18:36.620)

What is the meaning of life?

Lex Fridman (2:18:38.740)

Do you think about the big existential kind of,

Lex Fridman (2:18:41.820)

why the hell we're here?

Lex Fridman (2:18:43.180)

It's a cosmic kind of joke kind of in a weird way, right?

Lex Fridman (2:18:46.540)

I mean, Joe said it the other day on,

Tim Dillon (2:18:49.300)

maybe it was you saying that like,

Lex Fridman (2:18:51.500)

he was just like, you know,

Tim Dillon (2:18:52.580)

by the time you figure out what it is, you're out of here.

Lex Fridman (2:18:55.300)

You know, it's kind of interesting.

Tim Dillon (2:18:56.620)

Or you even start to figure out what it is,

Lex Fridman (2:18:58.300)

you're out of here.

Tim Dillon (2:18:59.140)

It's like, that's kind of funny.

Lex Fridman (2:19:00.660)

It's like, you don't get enough time to truly,

Tim Dillon (2:19:04.700)

I think the meaning of life is just like,

Lex Fridman (2:19:08.100)

at the end of the day, do you feel it was time well spent?

Lex Fridman (2:19:11.980)

Was it time well spent?

Lex Fridman (2:19:14.100)

That's really what it is.

Tim Dillon (2:19:16.460)

If you look back, do you go,

Lex Fridman (2:19:17.700)

hey, it was time well spent.

Tim Dillon (2:19:20.580)

Pretty good ride.

Lex Fridman (2:19:21.420)

It was a pretty good ride.

Tim Dillon (2:19:22.260)

I did a lot of things.

Lex Fridman (2:19:27.020)

Doing what you say is a part of it, I think.

Tim Dillon (2:19:30.420)

If you say you're going to do something, maybe doing it.

Lex Fridman (2:19:34.180)

That seems to be extrapolating the meaning of life question

Lex Fridman (2:19:38.060)

to like, you know, what did you come here to do?

Lex Fridman (2:19:40.940)

I think it goes down deep of like, who are you

Lex Fridman (2:19:43.100)

and what do you want and you know,

Lex Fridman (2:19:44.980)

what are you suited to do and what?

Tim Dillon (2:19:47.060)

It does seem that like, the people who are most enlightened

Lex Fridman (2:19:51.260)

that I've ever met or read books by,

Tim Dillon (2:19:54.340)

they ultimately land on humor.

Lex Fridman (2:19:56.300)

Like, they don't take shit seriously.

Tim Dillon (2:19:58.380)

They embrace the absurdity of it all

Lex Fridman (2:20:01.060)

and just kind of laugh at it in this kind of simple way.

Lex Fridman (2:20:04.780)

So it does seem that humor is like,

Lex Fridman (2:20:08.260)

one of the fundamental truths of this universe we're in.

Lex Fridman (2:20:12.340)

And somehow.

Lex Fridman (2:20:13.180)

It's love, it's love.

Lex Fridman (2:20:14.420)

Humor can be love, right?

Lex Fridman (2:20:16.860)

People laughing, that that sound is kind of like,

Tim Dillon (2:20:20.500)

Carolyn Knapp, who wrote a book called,

Lex Fridman (2:20:22.260)

Drinking a Love Story, which is a really good book

Tim Dillon (2:20:25.780)

about not drinking.

Lex Fridman (2:20:27.820)

Drinking and then not drinking.

Lex Fridman (2:20:29.500)

And she said, you could understand things as love.

Lex Fridman (2:20:34.460)

I think one of the last lines of the thing is like,

Tim Dillon (2:20:36.780)

people talking about their experiences in life,

Lex Fridman (2:20:39.460)

that could be love.

Tim Dillon (2:20:40.320)

Like, you know, laughter is love.

Lex Fridman (2:20:41.740)

Like, I feel like love and finding it

Tim Dillon (2:20:43.960)

wherever you could find it is why we're here.

Lex Fridman (2:20:46.380)

That's that connection.

Lex Fridman (2:20:47.980)

And laughter can be love.

Lex Fridman (2:20:49.660)

And, you know, figuring out, you know,

Tim Dillon (2:20:53.200)

something that makes life better

Lex Fridman (2:20:56.100)

for a lot of people can be love.

Tim Dillon (2:20:57.860)

You know, whether it's a vaccine

Lex Fridman (2:20:59.260)

or a technological advancement or whatever.

Tim Dillon (2:21:02.180)

Like, you know, all of those things,

Lex Fridman (2:21:04.380)

I think, can be that feeling.

Lex Fridman (2:21:06.380)

And I think that's what's important.

Lex Fridman (2:21:07.980)

It connects you to a larger frequency, you know?

Tim Dillon (2:21:11.380)

I don't think there's a better way to end it, Tim.

Lex Fridman (2:21:13.460)

I hope you're one of the voices.

Tim Dillon (2:21:15.740)

I truly believe that your legacy

Lex Fridman (2:21:17.580)

would be one of the most important voices of our time,

Tim Dillon (2:21:20.000)

because you're fearless and challenging all the absurdity

Lex Fridman (2:21:22.900)

of the nonsense of our social and political discourse.

Lex Fridman (2:21:28.500)

So I hope you keep doing it.

Lex Fridman (2:21:30.180)

I'm a fan.

Tim Dillon (2:21:31.000)

I'm still a bit starstruck, so.

Lex Fridman (2:21:33.140)

I'll stop it.

Tim Dillon (2:21:33.980)

Listen, I was your intellectual capacity.

Lex Fridman (2:21:38.420)

Enjoying anything I do only underscores

Lex Fridman (2:21:41.420)

how truly fucked we are.

Lex Fridman (2:21:43.120)

But thank you very much.

Tim Dillon (2:21:46.860)

Yeah, thank you for talking today.

Lex Fridman (2:21:49.220)

Thank you, brother.

Tim Dillon (2:21:50.940)

Thanks for listening to this conversation with Tim Dillon,

Lex Fridman (2:21:53.300)

and thank you to our sponsors.

Tim Dillon (2:21:55.300)

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Lex Fridman (2:21:58.020)

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Tim Dillon (2:22:00.600)

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Lex Fridman (2:22:04.620)

and Rev Speech Detect Service.

Lex Fridman (2:22:07.140)

So the choices, business, health, sanity, or transcripts.

Lex Fridman (2:22:12.140)

Choose wisely, my friends, and if you wish,

Tim Dillon (2:22:14.940)

click the sponsor links below to get a discount

Lex Fridman (2:22:17.300)

and to support this podcast.

Lex Fridman (2:22:19.740)

And now, let me leave you some words from George Carlin.

Lex Fridman (2:22:23.620)

Scratch any cynic, and you will find a disappointed idealist.

Tim Dillon (2:22:28.620)

Thank you for listening, and hope to see you next time.

Lex Fridman (30:00.000)

Let's talk a bit about Alex Jones.

Lex Fridman (30:04.640)

So you've gotten a chance to talk to him

Lex Fridman (30:06.780)

while you were on the Joe Rogan Experience.

Tim Dillon (30:09.080)

I've been on Alex's show.

Lex Fridman (30:10.520)

I've talked, I've had Alex on my show.

Tim Dillon (30:12.920)

I've talked to Alex for three hours

Lex Fridman (30:15.320)

in front of, I guess it was maybe like 15 million people

Tim Dillon (30:18.080)

right on Joe's show.

Lex Fridman (30:19.040)

It was a really wild conversation.

Tim Dillon (30:20.660)

I think it was one of the coolest moments in broadcasting

Lex Fridman (30:24.320)

that clearly that I've ever been a part of.

Lex Fridman (30:26.760)

But I think it goes in the lexicon of like,

Lex Fridman (30:29.180)

these are big podcasts.

Tim Dillon (30:31.240)

Like I think it's one of the biggest podcasts.

Lex Fridman (30:33.140)

A week before the election, Alex Jones.

Tim Dillon (30:35.300)

I'm really grateful that Joe gave me the opportunity

Lex Fridman (30:37.280)

to be there.

Lex Fridman (30:38.440)

And it was just an amazing conversation to watch.

Lex Fridman (30:41.400)

What was the shirt you wore?

Tim Dillon (30:43.600)

Fridges Lane.

Lex Fridman (30:44.440)

It was a fun joke that no one in tech got

Tim Dillon (30:46.520)

because we all know how funny they are.

Lex Fridman (30:48.760)

But the tech writers, which is mainly blue haired.

Tim Dillon (30:50.800)

I do not agree with these statements.

Lex Fridman (30:51.640)

It's mainly blue haired people

Tim Dillon (30:53.200)

whose goal in life is to find things

Lex Fridman (30:55.600)

to give them orgasms with.

Tim Dillon (30:57.440)

If you want to dye your hair blue, it's your choice.

Lex Fridman (31:00.200)

I respect it.

Lex Fridman (31:01.040)

Yeah, but is it your choice?

Lex Fridman (31:02.520)

But at the end of the day, it's like,

Tim Dillon (31:04.480)

all the tech writers, like a lot of people just,

Lex Fridman (31:06.520)

and I'm not, I'm just maligning tech unfairly.

Lex Fridman (31:08.920)

But a lot of people that sense there's a humor

Lex Fridman (31:10.400)

were like, he's advocating for human trafficking.

Tim Dillon (31:12.800)

I'm like, it's clearly a joke

Lex Fridman (31:13.960)

because we're coming off the believe all women.

Tim Dillon (31:16.600)

We're coming off that.

Lex Fridman (31:17.760)

And it's very funny to just say Fridges Lane,

Tim Dillon (31:20.240)

hey man, believe all women.

Lex Fridman (31:21.360)

Like, it's just our politics and our public sphere

Tim Dillon (31:24.840)

is so schizophrenic right now

Lex Fridman (31:26.880)

that when you point that out,

Tim Dillon (31:28.360)

people are going to be angry with you.

Lex Fridman (31:29.880)

But that was a fun shirt to wear.

Lex Fridman (31:31.680)

But on Alex, you know, I was one of the people

Lex Fridman (31:34.400)

that found him really entertaining,

Tim Dillon (31:37.280)

that the same kind of thing as with Bukowski,

Lex Fridman (31:40.560)

these kinds of personalities that are wild,

Tim Dillon (31:44.280)

crazy, full of ideas.

Lex Fridman (31:46.760)

They don't have to be grounded in truth at all,

Tim Dillon (31:48.480)

or they can be grounded in truth a little bit.

Lex Fridman (31:50.800)

Like, he's just playing with ideas,

Tim Dillon (31:53.040)

like a jazz musician, screaming sometimes.

Lex Fridman (31:55.880)

Obviously he has some demons.

Tim Dillon (31:57.760)

Sometimes he's super angry for no reason whatsoever

Lex Fridman (32:01.200)

at some weird thing that he's constructing in his own head.

Tim Dillon (32:04.440)

Sometimes he's super loving and peaceful,

Lex Fridman (32:06.520)

especially lately that I've heard him,

Tim Dillon (32:08.360)

I don't know if you've seen with him,

Lex Fridman (32:09.320)

with Michael Malice, where he's doing,

Tim Dillon (32:11.560)

like Malice was doing,

Lex Fridman (32:14.320)

like telling Alex Jones, I love you, Alex.

Tim Dillon (32:17.240)

Just this loving kind of softness and kindness

Lex Fridman (32:20.160)

underneath it all.

Tim Dillon (32:21.120)

I don't know what to make of any of it.

Lex Fridman (32:22.600)

And then there's this huge number of people

Tim Dillon (32:24.520)

that tell me that Alex Jones is dangerous for society.

Lex Fridman (32:29.440)

So what do you do with that?

Lex Fridman (32:30.640)

Do you think he's dangerous for society?

Lex Fridman (32:32.360)

Do you think he is one of the sort of

Tim Dillon (32:35.000)

entertaining personalities of our time

Lex Fridman (32:37.480)

that shouldn't be suppressed or somewhere in between?

Tim Dillon (32:39.800)

I don't think that Alex per se is dangerous for society.

Lex Fridman (32:43.880)

I think the greater danger for society comes again

Lex Fridman (32:46.520)

from stifling all dissent, right?

Lex Fridman (32:50.040)

All, like anybody with a voice that uses it,

Tim Dillon (32:53.120)

that critiques the government,

Lex Fridman (32:54.920)

and putting all of those people in a category

Lex Fridman (32:58.120)

and getting rid of them is incredibly dangerous.

Lex Fridman (33:00.280)

To me, more so.

Tim Dillon (33:01.840)

I think the biggest problem that Alex has ever had

Lex Fridman (33:05.440)

was when he questioned the Sandy Hook shooting.

Lex Fridman (33:08.160)

And that really was,

Lex Fridman (33:09.640)

because it really is this identifiable incident

Tim Dillon (33:12.920)

that you can look at where it did get away from him

Lex Fridman (33:15.480)

and a lot of his fans who,

Tim Dillon (33:16.880)

the people that are attracted to conspiracy stuff,

Lex Fridman (33:18.760)

and I have some of those fans,

Tim Dillon (33:20.040)

some of them are really smart people,

Lex Fridman (33:21.840)

some of them are mentally unwell.

Tim Dillon (33:23.480)

A lot of them happen to be mentally unwell.

Lex Fridman (33:25.680)

So when you have a fan base of people

Tim Dillon (33:27.160)

where some of them are mentally unwell,

Lex Fridman (33:28.920)

and you are questioning tragic events, okay?

Lex Fridman (33:33.920)

And Alex was right about Epstein.

Lex Fridman (33:35.520)

He was right about a lot of things,

Lex Fridman (33:36.680)

and he's got no credit for that.

Lex Fridman (33:38.360)

And I understand that this,

Tim Dillon (33:40.840)

sometimes when you write about 10 things

Lex Fridman (33:42.480)

and you're wrong about something,

Lex Fridman (33:43.800)

and the thing you're wrong about is so offensive to people,

Lex Fridman (33:48.560)

you're never gonna get any credit for being right,

Tim Dillon (33:50.600)

even though you were right more than when you were wrong.

Lex Fridman (33:52.880)

The problem was a lot of his fans who were crazy stalked,

Tim Dillon (33:56.760)

harassed these families and accused them of being actors

Lex Fridman (34:00.040)

and accused them of faking their children's deaths.

Tim Dillon (34:02.680)

It was just horrific experience.

Lex Fridman (34:06.040)

And Alex is tied to that.

Lex Fridman (34:08.080)

And how much he inspired that by what he did on his show,

Lex Fridman (34:14.360)

I don't know because I haven't watched hours and hours

Tim Dillon (34:18.160)

of that particular thing, the whole Sandy Hook thing.

Lex Fridman (34:22.600)

If you listen to him, he says, I really covered it.

Tim Dillon (34:24.720)

I kind of covered it and moved on.

Lex Fridman (34:26.440)

Other people go, no, he spent a long time on it.

Lex Fridman (34:29.000)

But that's the real danger of going into that territory

Lex Fridman (34:32.080)

over and over again,

Tim Dillon (34:33.320)

going everything's a false flag or everything's fake.

Lex Fridman (34:37.000)

I think Alex has actually been kind of reasonable.

Tim Dillon (34:39.440)

He's resisted a lot of the politics of racial resentment

Lex Fridman (34:43.440)

on the alt right, for example, he's resisted that.

Tim Dillon (34:46.040)

He's resisted the antisemitic currents

Lex Fridman (34:49.400)

of a lot of that politics.

Tim Dillon (34:51.200)

He's resisted a lot of the virulently anti trans

Lex Fridman (34:55.560)

or anti gay stuff.

Tim Dillon (34:56.400)

Now he does dip his toe into the water

Lex Fridman (34:57.960)

of like the culture wars, of course he does.

Lex Fridman (35:00.680)

But I've never really seen him,

Lex Fridman (35:03.640)

and I could be wrong about this,

Tim Dillon (35:05.080)

embrace white nationalism or identitarianism.

Lex Fridman (35:08.520)

I've never seen him really go antisemitic.

Tim Dillon (35:10.520)

I've never seen him take that route.

Lex Fridman (35:12.880)

When I grew up and I would turn him on every now and then,

Tim Dillon (35:15.320)

he was talking about NAFTA, the WTO,

Lex Fridman (35:17.200)

he's talking about 9 11,

Tim Dillon (35:18.480)

he was talking about the world trade organizations

Lex Fridman (35:22.760)

and a lot of these big conferences,

Tim Dillon (35:24.040)

whether it was the Bilderberg group,

Lex Fridman (35:25.840)

whether it was a Bohemian Grove, which he infiltrated.

Lex Fridman (35:28.800)

And he was talking about,

Lex Fridman (35:29.680)

hey, here are the most powerful people in the world.

Tim Dillon (35:31.480)

Here's what they're doing.

Lex Fridman (35:32.760)

And here's how it affects you.

Lex Fridman (35:34.200)

And that was interesting to me

Lex Fridman (35:35.560)

because no one else was really talking about it

Tim Dillon (35:37.720)

except Alex Jones, occasionally Art Bell on WABC.

Lex Fridman (35:42.040)

You'd listen to him at night, right?

Tim Dillon (35:45.360)

I think Alex became very controversial

Lex Fridman (35:48.200)

when he decided to back Donald Trump.

Lex Fridman (35:50.040)

And then he has a considerable following

Lex Fridman (35:51.960)

and a considerable audience

Tim Dillon (35:53.640)

that he was then able to marshal

Lex Fridman (35:56.760)

in the direction of supporting Donald Trump.

Tim Dillon (35:59.920)

That was when the spotlight,

Lex Fridman (36:02.000)

because then he was talking to Trump, Trump did his show,

Lex Fridman (36:05.520)

Alex Jones just got bigger, right?

Lex Fridman (36:07.360)

And he blew up, that's the term, right?

Tim Dillon (36:09.000)

He blew off, he put out the Good HBO special,

Lex Fridman (36:13.800)

whatever you wanna call it.

Tim Dillon (36:14.680)

He has a hit song, he blew up.

Lex Fridman (36:16.840)

And then people started looking at the things

Tim Dillon (36:18.560)

that he was associated with.

Lex Fridman (36:20.280)

The Sandy Hook thing is a blemish on his record.

Tim Dillon (36:22.160)

I do believe he regrets it.

Lex Fridman (36:23.680)

But again, I do see the point of the families

Tim Dillon (36:25.600)

who are like, dude, fuck this guy forever.

Lex Fridman (36:27.480)

This is the worst thing I ever went through.

Tim Dillon (36:29.360)

It's a very tough, I understand the people that say that.

Lex Fridman (36:35.680)

I understand, and I understand the people that go,

Tim Dillon (36:38.720)

when you have tech companies that act

Lex Fridman (36:41.280)

in a coordinated manner to just get rid of someone,

Tim Dillon (36:43.640)

they don't have any way to defend themselves.

Lex Fridman (36:46.600)

It's a little terrifying when you think

Lex Fridman (36:49.120)

about that power being abused and how wouldn't it be?

Lex Fridman (36:53.520)

Do you think he should have not have been banned

Lex Fridman (36:56.040)

from all these platforms?

Lex Fridman (36:57.120)

I don't think, I do think that

Lex Fridman (36:59.520)

if you are a private company, right?

Lex Fridman (37:01.680)

I do think, and this is where you run into this problem.

Tim Dillon (37:04.680)

I don't know if these tech companies

Lex Fridman (37:06.680)

were government utilities, would that decrease

Lex Fridman (37:09.480)

people's likelihood of being banned?

Lex Fridman (37:11.000)

I don't know, right?

Lex Fridman (37:12.880)

So I understand the benefit of them being treated

Lex Fridman (37:18.040)

like public utilities and people thinking

Tim Dillon (37:19.800)

they have the right to a Twitter.

Lex Fridman (37:21.600)

I've never, I don't know, I have very little confidence.

Tim Dillon (37:25.440)

I mean, the government's trying to roll out a vaccine

Lex Fridman (37:27.120)

in California and we vaccinated like five people.

Lex Fridman (37:29.580)

I mean, in terms of what we need to do in the state, right?

Lex Fridman (37:32.720)

So maybe if it was a government utility,

Tim Dillon (37:34.800)

I do think someone like Alex,

Lex Fridman (37:37.600)

like there should be some process.

Lex Fridman (37:40.720)

So if you're gonna get rid of someone,

Lex Fridman (37:42.040)

they should have a way to defend themselves.

Tim Dillon (37:44.280)

There should be more democratic process

Lex Fridman (37:50.120)

that you can go through

Tim Dillon (37:51.860)

than just being unilaterally taken off something.

Lex Fridman (37:54.580)

But like, then you run into the,

Lex Fridman (37:57.160)

you're like, am I gonna say that everyone deserves?

Lex Fridman (37:58.800)

No, if you're threatening or harassing people

Tim Dillon (38:00.920)

or threatening to kill them,

Lex Fridman (38:02.000)

publishing their private information,

Tim Dillon (38:03.240)

if you're committing crimes on these platforms,

Lex Fridman (38:05.840)

obviously the people that own these platforms

Tim Dillon (38:07.800)

are gonna be like, we're not gonna allow this to happen.

Lex Fridman (38:10.400)

So I understand that there is a line, right?

Tim Dillon (38:14.280)

There is some, like people that say there's no line

Lex Fridman (38:16.600)

aren't really thinking, like there is a line.

Tim Dillon (38:19.000)

I just thought that line seems to be moving all the time

Lex Fridman (38:22.680)

and it seems to be a very hard thing to police.

Lex Fridman (38:24.960)

But I don't think you can remove a guy off everything

Lex Fridman (38:28.200)

and then also bank accounts won't give him debit cards

Tim Dillon (38:31.000)

or credit cards, I don't know if you talked to him

Lex Fridman (38:32.360)

about that, but like, you know,

Tim Dillon (38:34.080)

there were financial institutions that were refusing

Lex Fridman (38:36.040)

to let him park his money there.

Tim Dillon (38:38.000)

So, I mean, it really does get pretty terrifying

Lex Fridman (38:42.160)

pretty quickly.

Tim Dillon (38:44.040)

Probably without any transparency from those companies.

Lex Fridman (38:46.640)

So you're right, it feels like there should be a process

Tim Dillon (38:50.440)

of just having, for him to defend himself.

Lex Fridman (38:54.160)

I think there needs to be a process

Tim Dillon (38:55.760)

for people to defend themselves.

Lex Fridman (38:59.160)

Every day I wake up and I go,

Tim Dillon (39:00.880)

is something I said in a video gonna get taken

Lex Fridman (39:03.040)

out of context, is somebody gonna get angry,

Tim Dillon (39:05.000)

is somebody gonna be, you know, I say wild stuff

Lex Fridman (39:07.840)

because that's what makes me laugh,

Tim Dillon (39:09.240)

that's what makes my friends laugh

Lex Fridman (39:10.300)

and that's what makes my audience laugh.

Lex Fridman (39:12.200)

So I never ever, people, you know, whatever political side

Lex Fridman (39:17.200)

you come down on, I think if you make your living speaking,

Tim Dillon (39:20.660)

it's always interesting to me if you are pro

Lex Fridman (39:24.620)

the deplatforming, that's odd.

Tim Dillon (39:27.320)

It's interesting to consider a kind of a jury context

Lex Fridman (39:32.800)

to where, you know, there's transparency

Tim Dillon (39:35.120)

about why your video about bombing Disney World

Lex Fridman (39:38.560)

might be taken down, like it gets taken down

Lex Fridman (39:43.040)

and then there is, it's almost like creating

Lex Fridman (39:45.920)

a little court case, a mini court case

Lex Fridman (39:47.800)

and not in a legal sense, but in the public sphere.

Lex Fridman (39:51.400)

And then people should be able to have, you know,

Tim Dillon (39:53.920)

we pick representatives of our current society

Lex Fridman (39:57.560)

and have a discussion about that and make a real vote.

Tim Dillon (40:00.760)

You know, just have like jury locks himself up

Lex Fridman (40:03.560)

in a discussion, that kind of process might be necessary.

Tim Dillon (40:08.100)

Right now, what happens is Twitter is completely,

Lex Fridman (40:11.720)

first of all, they're just mostly not aware

Tim Dillon (40:13.560)

of everything they're doing, there's too much stuff,

Lex Fridman (40:15.680)

but the stuff they're aware about,

Tim Dillon (40:18.000)

they make the decision in closed doors meetings

Lex Fridman (40:21.600)

and without any transparency to the rest of the company

Tim Dillon (40:25.400)

actually, but also transparency to the rest of the world.

Lex Fridman (40:29.480)

And so, and then all they say is we're making decisions

Tim Dillon (40:33.900)

because the people, they use things like violence.

Lex Fridman (40:37.760)

So violence equals bad and if this person is quote unquote,

Tim Dillon (40:41.640)

inciting violence, therefore that gives us enough reason

Lex Fridman (40:44.800)

to ban them without any kind of process.

Tim Dillon (40:48.000)

I mean, it's interesting, I'm torn in the whole thing.

Lex Fridman (40:51.840)

If it was indeed, there's no transparency about it,

Lex Fridman (40:54.540)

but if Parler was indeed inciting violence,

Lex Fridman (40:59.000)

like if there was brewing of violence, potential violence

Tim Dillon (41:02.240)

where, you know, thousands of people might die

Lex Fridman (41:06.820)

because of some kind of riot, like this is the scary thing

Tim Dillon (41:10.800)

about mob, about when a lot of people get together.

Lex Fridman (41:15.320)

Who are good people, like legitimately good people

Tim Dillon (41:19.080)

that love this country, that don't see enemies

Lex Fridman (41:21.960)

yet around them, but if they get excited together

Lex Fridman (41:26.080)

and there's guns involved and then some cop gets nervous

Lex Fridman (41:30.240)

and shoots one person, another person shoots the cop

Lex Fridman (41:33.440)

and then there's a lot of shooting involved

Lex Fridman (41:35.240)

and then it goes from five people dying in the Capitol

Tim Dillon (41:38.160)

to thousands of people dying in the Capitol.

Lex Fridman (41:41.040)

Well, in fairness to defend the people at the Capitol,

Tim Dillon (41:44.520)

they didn't shoot the cop, they bludgeoned him to death

Lex Fridman (41:47.700)

with a fire extinguisher.

Tim Dillon (41:49.560)

Yes.

Lex Fridman (41:50.400)

So I do wanna just kind of put that out

Tim Dillon (41:52.960)

as a defense of them.

Lex Fridman (41:54.720)

Listen, I'm sure there was some wild shit going on

Tim Dillon (41:57.400)

on Parler and I think the problem, here's the problem,

Lex Fridman (41:59.760)

right, there's a lot of people that just wanna go on

Tim Dillon (42:03.520)

these sites and say they wanna kill everyone.

Lex Fridman (42:06.400)

And the problem is, you know, at what point

Lex Fridman (42:09.960)

do you shut them all down?

Lex Fridman (42:11.680)

Like I think a lot of people are just living in a world

Tim Dillon (42:14.440)

where they're powerless, they don't have any political

Lex Fridman (42:17.280)

power, they don't have any economic power, right?

Tim Dillon (42:19.680)

They can't throw their money around.

Lex Fridman (42:22.040)

They don't have healthcare, their job security isn't great.

Tim Dillon (42:26.100)

They might be living in a community that doesn't have

Lex Fridman (42:28.580)

the resources they would like it to have.

Tim Dillon (42:31.440)

They're not happy and thrilled.

Lex Fridman (42:34.040)

And then they have these sites where they can go on

Lex Fridman (42:36.060)

and just say, man, I'd like to fucking burn it all down.

Lex Fridman (42:39.740)

And distinguishing a guy blowing off steam

Lex Fridman (42:42.720)

and saying wild stuff from a genuine threat

Lex Fridman (42:45.960)

is a very hard thing to do, you know?

Tim Dillon (42:49.000)

Like I've threatened to kill, I got banned from Airbnb,

Lex Fridman (42:52.860)

I threatened to kill the people that banned me,

Tim Dillon (42:57.520)

comedically, comedically, this is a joke.

Lex Fridman (43:00.520)

I'm not going to kill you, this is a joke

Tim Dillon (43:02.760)

because I'm blowing off steam and I'm angry.

Lex Fridman (43:05.140)

Do you know how many people that my parents,

Tim Dillon (43:07.280)

like my dad's like, I'm gonna fucking kill this guy,

Lex Fridman (43:09.480)

my mom's like, I'm gonna fucking kill.

Tim Dillon (43:11.560)

They were talking about each other.

Lex Fridman (43:13.160)

But none of it ever happened, but we should be,

Tim Dillon (43:17.360)

I think you have to create a space for people

Lex Fridman (43:21.220)

to threaten to overthrow the government

Tim Dillon (43:24.160)

as long as they don't violently do it.

Lex Fridman (43:26.880)

I mean, does that make any sense?

Tim Dillon (43:28.720)

I mean, as long as they're not gonna go hurt innocent people,

Lex Fridman (43:32.280)

what are you gonna do?

Tim Dillon (43:33.120)

Like there's so many people out there that,

Lex Fridman (43:34.920)

that's why a lot of these things like 4chan, these sites,

Tim Dillon (43:38.020)

a lot of people going on there,

Lex Fridman (43:39.160)

they just wanna say the most fucked up shit

Tim Dillon (43:41.600)

because it's the thing that gives them,

Lex Fridman (43:44.480)

they can laugh or they can release steam

Lex Fridman (43:46.480)

and it is immature, it is stupid.

Lex Fridman (43:48.980)

It's not productive, it's not, you know,

Lex Fridman (43:51.280)

but at the end of the day,

Lex Fridman (43:53.880)

if you're not gonna give people health insurance,

Tim Dillon (43:56.280)

you gotta give them something.

Lex Fridman (43:57.960)

It's like when someone in this country dies

Lex Fridman (44:00.020)

that everyone disagrees with, right?

Lex Fridman (44:01.880)

Political figure, media figure,

Tim Dillon (44:03.720)

a lot of people dance on their grave online

Lex Fridman (44:06.160)

and then everyone, people goes,

Lex Fridman (44:07.920)

and the other side will always do it.

Lex Fridman (44:09.760)

Like if a conservative dies and everyone goes, great,

Tim Dillon (44:12.280)

conservatives goes, this is grotesque that you,

Lex Fridman (44:15.480)

and then when RBG dies, they all have parties

Lex Fridman (44:17.880)

and the conservatives go, great.

Lex Fridman (44:20.680)

You have to let people in this country

Tim Dillon (44:22.960)

enjoy the deaths of their enemies.

Lex Fridman (44:26.280)

You do because they don't have much else.

Tim Dillon (44:29.560)

Again, if you gave them other things,

Lex Fridman (44:31.680)

you might say, guy, you can go get an E operation.

Lex Fridman (44:34.780)

Why don't you stop?

Lex Fridman (44:36.960)

But if they're working for shit wages

Lex Fridman (44:40.440)

and you haven't figured out a way to treat them,

Lex Fridman (44:44.440)

treat their cancer diagnosis, and they don't like,

Tim Dillon (44:48.160)

I mean, life, you know, you gotta,

Lex Fridman (44:51.240)

you gotta derive pleasure from something, right?

Tim Dillon (44:54.240)

It's an interesting point that anger is a good valve,

Lex Fridman (44:57.720)

like to, if your life is suffering,

Tim Dillon (45:01.760)

that there's something very powerful about anger,

Lex Fridman (45:04.920)

but I still have hope that it doesn't have to be.

Tim Dillon (45:07.680)

I mean, that kind of channeling into anger

Lex Fridman (45:10.960)

that then becomes hate led us

Tim Dillon (45:13.480)

into a lot of troubles in human history.

Lex Fridman (45:15.800)

So you have to be careful empowering people too much

Tim Dillon (45:20.720)

in that anger, especially, I think my,

Lex Fridman (45:24.840)

I think I understand why people are nervous about Parler,

Tim Dillon (45:28.960)

about Twitter and so on.

Lex Fridman (45:30.680)

Because all that shit talking about violence

Tim Dillon (45:35.160)

was now paired with let's get together at this location.

Lex Fridman (45:40.000)

This was a new thing.

Tim Dillon (45:41.400)

Like it's not just being on whatever platform talking shit,

Lex Fridman (45:46.200)

it's saying we're going to in physical space meet.

Lex Fridman (45:49.840)

And then everybody got, all these platforms got nervous.

Lex Fridman (45:52.520)

Well, what happens when all these shit talkers,

Tim Dillon (45:55.060)

all these angry people that are just steam,

Lex Fridman (45:57.960)

letting off steam meet in a physical space.

Lex Fridman (46:01.080)

And there was probably overreach,

Lex Fridman (46:03.960)

almost definitely overreach,

Lex Fridman (46:05.240)

but I can understand why they were nervous.

Lex Fridman (46:07.240)

I agree.

Tim Dillon (46:08.080)

There doesn't seem to be,

Lex Fridman (46:08.900)

and this is when Trump got elected

Lex Fridman (46:10.160)

and when you have like, whatever you have, right?

Lex Fridman (46:11.960)

Whether you have riots in Portland and Seattle,

Tim Dillon (46:13.600)

where you have the Antifa people doing crazy things,

Lex Fridman (46:15.760)

you have like the people storming the Capitol.

Tim Dillon (46:18.660)

There never seems to be a ton of an examination

Lex Fridman (46:22.000)

of why these ideas are becoming popular.

Lex Fridman (46:24.560)

Why are people so angry?

Lex Fridman (46:26.240)

What is leading people to this?

Lex Fridman (46:28.280)

Why are we here?

Lex Fridman (46:29.760)

What about their lives is to the point

Lex Fridman (46:32.280)

where they need to show up at these places?

Lex Fridman (46:34.880)

And like, and obviously there's going to be people

Tim Dillon (46:36.600)

on the fringe.

Lex Fridman (46:37.440)

There'll always be the mentally unwell.

Tim Dillon (46:38.900)

There'll always be people that want to destroy society.

Lex Fridman (46:41.460)

But when you look at how popular,

Tim Dillon (46:43.640)

large, long discredited things,

Lex Fridman (46:46.360)

whether it's fascism, totalitarian communism,

Lex Fridman (46:50.080)

all of these things are like, why are they back?

Lex Fridman (46:53.320)

Why are they back in a big way?

Lex Fridman (46:54.800)

And why are people so fed up with the status quo

Lex Fridman (46:58.660)

that they're finding solace

Tim Dillon (47:02.640)

in the most extreme discredited theories

Lex Fridman (47:07.560)

of how to run and operate societies,

Tim Dillon (47:10.000)

theories that have led to deaths of a lot of people.

Lex Fridman (47:11.720)

So to me, I'm like, if those people at the Capitol,

Tim Dillon (47:17.560)

yes, if they were going to work,

Lex Fridman (47:20.240)

if they were able to go out and drink at Chili's,

Lex Fridman (47:24.680)

if they were able to get a fucking checkup, right?

Lex Fridman (47:29.320)

Like if their job paid a little bit better,

Lex Fridman (47:32.080)

and I'm not saying that this is all the reason, right?

Lex Fridman (47:34.600)

I'm sure that there's a lot of people there

Tim Dillon (47:36.120)

that are doing quite well and they're still nuts.

Lex Fridman (47:38.680)

But like the anger and the rage

Tim Dillon (47:40.760)

that's boiling to the surface of this society,

Lex Fridman (47:44.200)

does it come from the fact that across the board

Tim Dillon (47:49.200)

people in very different areas

Lex Fridman (47:51.680)

and with very different political beliefs

Tim Dillon (47:54.020)

feel like they are being fucked over

Lex Fridman (47:56.560)

and there's nothing they can do about it.

Tim Dillon (47:59.540)

That's what the baseline to me,

Lex Fridman (48:02.660)

they look at the people that run the country

Lex Fridman (48:05.080)

and run the world, whether they're tech titans,

Lex Fridman (48:07.840)

the guys that you talked to,

Tim Dillon (48:08.880)

or whether they're people that run the government,

Lex Fridman (48:11.780)

whether they're people that run large banks,

Tim Dillon (48:14.720)

large media companies,

Lex Fridman (48:16.380)

the people that have created this kind of infrastructure

Tim Dillon (48:20.480)

that everyone lives in,

Lex Fridman (48:21.720)

these people are incredibly powerless.

Lex Fridman (48:23.760)

And when you push people to that point,

Lex Fridman (48:26.800)

logically, sadly, and unfortunately,

Tim Dillon (48:30.040)

the next thing does seem to be violence.

Lex Fridman (48:33.600)

Yeah, the thing that troubles me a lot

Tim Dillon (48:36.680)

is you said nobody's asking why these beliefs are out there,

Lex Fridman (48:41.680)

but sometimes it's not even acknowledged

Tim Dillon (48:44.340)

that people are hurting, people are angry,

Lex Fridman (48:49.800)

just even acknowledging that all the conspiracy theories

Tim Dillon (48:52.900)

that are out there, acknowledging that they're out there.

Lex Fridman (48:55.520)

And then people are thinking about it and talking about it

Tim Dillon (48:58.280)

just because otherwise,

Lex Fridman (49:00.920)

so it's not acknowledged in this nuanced way.

Lex Fridman (49:03.260)

What happens is you say,

Lex Fridman (49:04.660)

okay, 70 million people are white supremacists.

Tim Dillon (49:07.660)

It's just throwing a kind of blanket statement.

Lex Fridman (49:12.160)

And of course that gets them angrier

Lex Fridman (49:16.160)

and makes them feel more powerless.

Lex Fridman (49:19.640)

And that ultimately, that's what's been painful for me

Tim Dillon (49:25.000)

to see is that there's not an acknowledgement

Lex Fridman (49:28.280)

that most people are good.

Tim Dillon (49:31.960)

Right.

Lex Fridman (49:32.840)

There's circumstances where it's just you're pissed off.

Tim Dillon (49:36.960)

Right.

Lex Fridman (49:37.800)

Because you are powerless.

Tim Dillon (49:38.780)

I mean, most of us are powerless.

Lex Fridman (49:39.960)

You could fall in with a bad crowd.

Tim Dillon (49:42.240)

That's the thing, you can just fall in.

Lex Fridman (49:44.400)

And it doesn't mean that there's not blame.

Tim Dillon (49:47.120)

Obviously you have agency, you're a person.

Lex Fridman (49:51.560)

But the idea that you could be rehabilitated,

Tim Dillon (49:54.000)

you could do something stupid

Lex Fridman (49:55.400)

or you could fall into a group of people that are,

Lex Fridman (49:58.440)

and then in a few years you can go,

Lex Fridman (49:59.800)

what the fuck was I doing?

Tim Dillon (50:02.080)

I'm an ex drug addict.

Lex Fridman (50:03.040)

I know what it's like to go from being one thing

Tim Dillon (50:05.200)

to being another thing.

Lex Fridman (50:06.880)

I'm still a drug addict.

Tim Dillon (50:07.800)

If I would use drugs right now or drink,

Lex Fridman (50:09.600)

I would still be addicted to them.

Tim Dillon (50:11.200)

I mean, it's not something that I can ever change

Lex Fridman (50:13.520)

about myself, but I know what it's like

Tim Dillon (50:14.880)

to go from one thing to another thing.

Lex Fridman (50:16.340)

So when you look at racism or whatever ism,

Tim Dillon (50:19.960)

homophobia, misogyny, whatever you're looking at,

Lex Fridman (50:22.820)

antisemitism, and you go, that's a fixed condition

Tim Dillon (50:26.060)

where nobody's ever going to be able to change.

Lex Fridman (50:28.480)

Nobody's ever gonna be able to be rehabilitated.

Tim Dillon (50:30.880)

Nobody's ever going to be able to reimagine themselves

Lex Fridman (50:34.680)

in a different way.

Tim Dillon (50:35.840)

To me, you're just, you're throwing away someone

Lex Fridman (50:38.960)

and you're making them feel helpless and worthless.

Lex Fridman (50:41.860)

And that's gonna lead to antisocial behavior

Lex Fridman (50:44.020)

that spills out into the violence.

Tim Dillon (50:45.960)

We don't have a very redemptive society.

Lex Fridman (50:48.760)

That's a huge factor.

Tim Dillon (50:50.560)

We don't have a redemptive society.

Lex Fridman (50:52.640)

That's why I like O.J. Simpson.

Tim Dillon (50:54.600)

Because O.J. Simpson, yes, he did a bad thing supposedly.

Lex Fridman (50:58.120)

But he's very kind now on Twitter

Lex Fridman (51:01.280)

and he makes very nice points about how we all have

Lex Fridman (51:04.040)

to get involved in the political process

Lex Fridman (51:05.640)

and he's on golf courses and I like watching people golf.

Lex Fridman (51:07.920)

I don't do it, but I like watching him do it.

Lex Fridman (51:10.080)

And he's like an elder statesman

Lex Fridman (51:12.040)

because I remember him from the naked gun.

Lex Fridman (51:13.880)

And I choose to forgive him for whatever happened there,

Lex Fridman (51:19.400)

which I don't know.

Lex Fridman (51:20.980)

But I choose to forgive him really for,

Lex Fridman (51:23.660)

I mean, obviously, what they say is

Tim Dillon (51:25.800)

he cut his wife's head off.

Lex Fridman (51:27.000)

But I can look past that and redeem him

Tim Dillon (51:30.880)

because he's very stable on Twitter and he's a good,

Lex Fridman (51:35.160)

like I see all these people going crazy on Twitter

Lex Fridman (51:37.580)

and I'm like, O.J.'s lived a full life.

Lex Fridman (51:41.600)

I think there's a benefit to that.

Tim Dillon (51:43.040)

There's a benefit to kind of living a full life.

Lex Fridman (51:45.480)

Yeah, how many of us have not at least tried

Lex Fridman (51:48.000)

to murder somebody?

Lex Fridman (51:48.840)

100%, listen, O.J.'s had the highs and the lows,

Lex Fridman (51:53.840)

but he did it on his terms.

Lex Fridman (51:56.760)

And there's a real.

Tim Dillon (51:57.600)

It's like a Frank Sinatra song.

Lex Fridman (51:59.560)

Yeah, he did it my way.

Tim Dillon (52:00.480)

I mean, there's a benefit to that.

Lex Fridman (52:02.100)

And he seems like a very well adjusted person now.

Lex Fridman (52:04.160)

So I mean, I don't know, how is that a fact?

Lex Fridman (52:07.460)

But it is a fact and that's an uncomfortable fact.

Tim Dillon (52:09.800)

Well, this is a strong case of forgiveness

Lex Fridman (52:12.080)

in one of the more extreme cases, I suppose.

Lex Fridman (52:16.240)

But yeah, there's not a process of forgiveness.

Lex Fridman (52:18.820)

It seems like people just take a single event from your,

Tim Dillon (52:21.400)

sometimes a single statement from your past

Lex Fridman (52:23.920)

and use that as a categorical like capture

Tim Dillon (52:29.800)

of the essence of this particular human being.

Lex Fridman (52:31.880)

So murder might be a thing that you should get a time out

Tim Dillon (52:36.800)

for a little while.

Lex Fridman (52:38.280)

Murder is bad.

Tim Dillon (52:39.660)

Murder, and let's just say that.

Lex Fridman (52:42.640)

Murder is not good.

Tim Dillon (52:44.160)

I'm glad you make this definitive statement.

Lex Fridman (52:46.560)

O.J. is an interesting cat because you're like,

Tim Dillon (52:50.640)

he's very stable on Twitter.

Lex Fridman (52:53.300)

He's very like, he's like, let's take a look at it, guys.

Tim Dillon (52:55.880)

Like we need more of his energy.

Lex Fridman (52:57.320)

That's what I'm trying to say.

Tim Dillon (52:58.640)

I know like, yes, it was bad.

Lex Fridman (53:00.600)

He killed the woman in the waiter.

Tim Dillon (53:03.040)

I was not for that.

Lex Fridman (53:04.600)

I wish he didn't do that.

Lex Fridman (53:05.880)

But the trial, the O.J. Simpson trial was such a fun thing.

Lex Fridman (53:10.040)

And like you said, we need more fun people in society.

Tim Dillon (53:12.840)

Speaking of fun people,

Lex Fridman (53:14.040)

you've, your politics have been all over the place.

Tim Dillon (53:17.680)

I hope so.

Lex Fridman (53:18.840)

I hope so.

Tim Dillon (53:19.840)

I mean, imagine not,

Lex Fridman (53:21.340)

imagine someone whose politics weren't all over the place.

Tim Dillon (53:24.040)

It would seem odd.

Lex Fridman (53:26.040)

Right.

Tim Dillon (53:26.880)

In the 10 years that I've been politically conscious,

Lex Fridman (53:28.760)

just because I'm 35 and 20.

Tim Dillon (53:30.360)

No, I've probably been conscious for over two decades,

Lex Fridman (53:32.200)

but like Democrats have become Republicans,

Tim Dillon (53:34.600)

Republicans become Democrats.

Lex Fridman (53:36.560)

I remember when Ann Coulter said,

Tim Dillon (53:37.920)

we need to, he defended George W. Bush when he said,

Lex Fridman (53:40.120)

we need to go out and Christianize

Tim Dillon (53:41.880)

or modernize the Arab world.

Lex Fridman (53:44.080)

We need to democratize the Arab world.

Lex Fridman (53:45.800)

And then Ann Coulter backed Donald Trump.

Lex Fridman (53:48.460)

And all the right wing in America believed

Tim Dillon (53:50.800)

in nation building.

Lex Fridman (53:51.920)

They believed in going out and democratizing areas

Tim Dillon (53:56.140)

that might breed radical terrorists,

Lex Fridman (53:58.560)

whether it was Iraq or wherever you were going,

Tim Dillon (54:01.040)

toppling regimes and instituting

Lex Fridman (54:03.640)

new democratic norms in those countries.

Tim Dillon (54:05.760)

That was the right wing point of view when I grew up.

Lex Fridman (54:07.760)

Then the right wing switched to,

Tim Dillon (54:11.080)

we are going to be isolationist.

Lex Fridman (54:13.200)

We're going to take care of America.

Tim Dillon (54:15.120)

First and foremost,

Lex Fridman (54:16.280)

we're not going to go into other countries.

Lex Fridman (54:18.240)

And then the Democrats who, when I grew up,

Lex Fridman (54:20.040)

were doves and the right wing people were more hawkish.

Lex Fridman (54:23.960)

And the Democrats were like,

Lex Fridman (54:24.800)

the military solutions aren't the way.

Tim Dillon (54:27.680)

We need to have multilateral diplomatic coalitions

Lex Fridman (54:30.700)

to solve all the problems.

Tim Dillon (54:32.280)

Now, Rachel Maddow's like,

Lex Fridman (54:34.000)

let's nuke Russia every night on MSNBC.

Tim Dillon (54:37.360)

The Democrats are like,

Lex Fridman (54:38.480)

we need strong presence in Syria.

Tim Dillon (54:41.960)

We need a strong presence.

Lex Fridman (54:43.400)

We need to counter Putin all over the globe.

Tim Dillon (54:45.640)

We need to get, so they're more hawkish on things.

Lex Fridman (54:48.040)

So literally I have watched two political parties

Tim Dillon (54:52.360)

literally flip and it's crazy to watch.

Lex Fridman (54:54.920)

And in some sense I've watched that as well

Tim Dillon (54:58.100)

because when I first saw Barack Obama,

Lex Fridman (55:01.100)

I admired that he was against the war.

Tim Dillon (55:03.440)

This is whatever, maybe before he was a Senator,

Lex Fridman (55:07.600)

he spoke out against the Iraq war.

Lex Fridman (55:10.200)

And then it doesn't feel like,

Lex Fridman (55:17.240)

it feels like his administration was more hawkish

Tim Dillon (55:20.240)

than dovish in a sense with all the drone attacks,

Lex Fridman (55:25.680)

with the sort of inability to pull back,

Tim Dillon (55:28.280)

or at least in mass efficiently pull back

Lex Fridman (55:31.600)

from all the military involvement

Tim Dillon (55:33.560)

that we have all over the world.

Lex Fridman (55:34.840)

So, and just the language.

Lex Fridman (55:36.360)

What I think is interesting about that,

Lex Fridman (55:37.840)

what's interesting about Obama,

Tim Dillon (55:38.880)

cause this is a very interesting study,

Lex Fridman (55:40.560)

is that presidents are controlled in very different ways.

Tim Dillon (55:43.960)

Presidents can be controlled by different factors,

Lex Fridman (55:48.000)

power factions within Washington.

Tim Dillon (55:51.040)

I think one of the reasons that Obama was maybe,

Lex Fridman (55:54.600)

you had a very close relationship with John Brennan,

Tim Dillon (55:56.400)

he was a CIA director.

Lex Fridman (55:58.040)

And Obama was very close with John Brennan,

Lex Fridman (56:00.440)

and Obama was very, I think malleable to the extent

Lex Fridman (56:07.040)

that the CIA, and I've had CIA agents on my show,

Tim Dillon (56:09.720)

John Kiriakou, a guy who went to jail for exposing torture,

Lex Fridman (56:13.320)

was saying that like, you get into the Oval Office,

Tim Dillon (56:16.160)

all of a sudden you're having

Lex Fridman (56:17.000)

that presidential daily briefing every day,

Lex Fridman (56:18.860)

and the intelligence people come in and they go,

Lex Fridman (56:21.040)

listen man, I mean, there's gonna be a terrorist attack

Tim Dillon (56:23.720)

on your watch if you don't do X, Y, and Z.

Lex Fridman (56:25.880)

They go, they call it like blue book information,

Tim Dillon (56:28.960)

which is five levels above top secret,

Lex Fridman (56:30.720)

and they go like, hey man, a guy in Iran at a cafe

Tim Dillon (56:35.520)

said he's blowing everything up next week,

Lex Fridman (56:36.960)

and you know, I mean, it's the same thing as Parler,

Tim Dillon (56:38.440)

you don't know if it's true or not.

Lex Fridman (56:39.960)

But now the president's making a decision

Tim Dillon (56:41.600)

on usually a lot of uncorroborated intelligence

Lex Fridman (56:44.920)

that goes into a presentation for the president,

Tim Dillon (56:48.160)

where you're just terrified every day,

Lex Fridman (56:49.520)

and you don't want a terrorist attack on your watch.

Lex Fridman (56:51.560)

Now, so why are they getting all this information?

Lex Fridman (56:53.720)

Because a lot of the people in Washington

Tim Dillon (56:56.600)

have an interest in perpetual, constant, ongoing warfare,

Lex Fridman (57:00.040)

and there's a lot of financial gain to be had from that.

Lex Fridman (57:02.680)

So they're sneaking their information

Lex Fridman (57:04.400)

into the presentations that are going to the president,

Lex Fridman (57:07.200)

and then the president is now behaving and going,

Lex Fridman (57:09.200)

fuck, I don't want a bomb going off,

Tim Dillon (57:11.680)

we gotta do what we gotta do.

Lex Fridman (57:13.360)

And whatever version of that happens,

Tim Dillon (57:16.600)

that is really kind of what is happening,

Lex Fridman (57:18.520)

whereas the presidents are being controlled

Tim Dillon (57:21.920)

by forces that are outside of the political sphere,

Lex Fridman (57:25.600)

but very much still in it.

Lex Fridman (57:27.240)

And they have a lot of, that's what the deep state is.

Lex Fridman (57:29.000)

You know, Trump, there's a lot of ridiculing Trump

Tim Dillon (57:31.200)

of going, the deep state doesn't exist.

Lex Fridman (57:33.440)

It absolutely exists, there's been books about it

Tim Dillon (57:35.200)

written by liberal journalists.

Lex Fridman (57:36.800)

The deep state is only a term for unelected, largely,

Tim Dillon (57:42.000)

power factions in Washington, DC,

Lex Fridman (57:44.840)

that outlive any presidential administration.

Tim Dillon (57:47.880)

These are people that might work at the State Department,

Lex Fridman (57:50.240)

they might work at the Defense Department.

Tim Dillon (57:52.640)

These are people that are not always working officially

Lex Fridman (57:56.320)

in any government capacity.

Tim Dillon (57:57.880)

They might be private companies,

Lex Fridman (58:00.000)

they might be military contractors,

Tim Dillon (58:02.840)

they might be people at Boeing or Raytheon

Lex Fridman (58:04.920)

or General Dynamics.

Lex Fridman (58:06.200)

And they constitute a group of people

Lex Fridman (58:10.680)

that Trump kind of called the swamp,

Lex Fridman (58:11.920)

but Trump had really no interest in draining the swamp.

Lex Fridman (58:14.080)

But he articulated these things, and this is what it is.

Tim Dillon (58:18.720)

You have a lot of interested parties that have budgets

Lex Fridman (58:22.920)

that they want, big budgets.

Tim Dillon (58:24.600)

Everybody wants a budget in Washington,

Lex Fridman (58:26.320)

whether you know what it is, they want money.

Lex Fridman (58:29.320)

And these are the people who really control press.

Lex Fridman (58:31.680)

So this idea that the president is the be all end all

Tim Dillon (58:34.120)

has got to be smashed,

Lex Fridman (58:35.280)

which is why the horse race model of politics

Lex Fridman (58:38.080)

and being like, is it right wing?

Lex Fridman (58:39.360)

Is it left wing?

Lex Fridman (58:40.360)

Is it, what team am I on and what color am I wearing?

Lex Fridman (58:43.560)

It's very simplistic, but the reality is this is an empire.

Tim Dillon (58:47.240)

It's past its peak.

Lex Fridman (58:49.080)

We're in trouble.

Tim Dillon (58:50.000)

The United States is an empire past its peak.

Lex Fridman (58:51.920)

Yeah, I mean, that's just,

Tim Dillon (58:53.440)

you could prove that case in court.

Lex Fridman (58:55.960)

Well, let's go to court right now.

Lex Fridman (58:57.480)

But I do love the more complex idea

Lex Fridman (59:01.360)

that there's just human beings who crave power

Lex Fridman (59:04.560)

and seek ways to attain that power through different ways.

Lex Fridman (59:08.120)

If you have Barack Obama or George Bush or Donald Trump,

Tim Dillon (59:13.040)

there's different attack vectors.

Lex Fridman (59:15.160)

Correct.

Tim Dillon (59:16.000)

There's different ways to attain that power

Lex Fridman (59:17.680)

and then you can use that to leverage.

Lex Fridman (59:19.120)

And it probably doesn't have to be just in Washington, DC.

Lex Fridman (59:23.480)

There's people who crave power all over the world.

Tim Dillon (59:26.560)

Of course, but where we are now in Los Angeles,

Lex Fridman (59:29.360)

these people are all good.

Tim Dillon (59:31.560)

LA.

Lex Fridman (59:32.400)

Studio executives and people that I,

Tim Dillon (59:33.800)

from what I understand, they treat everyone fairly

Lex Fridman (59:36.360)

and they're nice, but he sees the bad guys,

Lex Fridman (59:40.560)

but out here in LA, everyone's lovely.

Lex Fridman (59:43.680)

So amidst this fun exploration in your mind

Tim Dillon (59:48.880)

through the political landscape that you've done

Lex Fridman (59:50.640)

over the past couple of decades

Tim Dillon (59:54.040)

that you've been conscious politically,

Lex Fridman (59:56.520)

where does Donald Trump fit into this picture for you?