Jay Jurden

On this episode of It’s Open, Ilana sits down with friend and colleague Jay Jurden — a powerhouse, rising star comic whose first comedy album JAY JURDEN, Y’ALL debuted at #1 on iTunes, his debut stand-up special YES MA’AM is streaming on HULU, and you can catch him around the country on his NOTHING SPECIAL tour or at his London debut in August. Jay and Ilana dig into the fraught cultural landscape of the stand-up comedy and podcast scenes, sorting out the divide between creators that are socially responsible and those that are socially (and politically) reckless and unaccountable. Jay Jurden is dazzling, sharp, and can spar with the best of them, and he is a fierce advocate for his black, queer, and trans community! Let’s go in - it’s open!

Host: Ilana Glazer
Producers: David Rooklin, Annika Carlson, Madeline Kim, Kelsie Kiley, Glennis Meagher
Video Producers: Lexa Krebs, Louise Nessralla
Audio Producers: Nicole Maupin, Rachel Suffian, Rebecca O’Neill
Lighting Director: Kevin Deming
Editor: Tovah Leibowitz
Graphics: Raymo Ventura
Outro Music: Don Hur

All Things It’s Open: linktr.ee/itsopenpod
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/itsopenpod
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@itsopenpod

Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:00

Welcome to It's Open with Alana Glazer. Today, my guest is a good friend of mine who I have conversations like this with all the time. And I'm so excited to be able to share it with you because we sort out reality, we can look at and confront reality together, but also just stay light about it. He is one of the best stand-up comedians working today. And he uh came to the scene here in New York City about 10 years ago and has just become known as one of the undeniable excellent talents. It's Jay Jordan. You know him from his album Jay Jordan, y'all, his debut stand-up special on Hulu, Yes Ma'am. And now he is on tour for you to see on the nothing special tour. But but it is something special. Anyway, come on in. It's open. Okay, so what happened today?

SPEAKER_00 0:51

What happened today? Okay, there's talk of the FCC chair and Trump basically saying that they want to look into seeing if it's okay or permissible or like hazardous to have non-binary and trans representation in TV shows for children under 12. So they like essentially ripped off another layer of the actually we're just gonna be very transphobic mask. And it's so upsetting because I saw this news, and then one of my first reactions to this news was to be like, okay, that's why I say jokes about trans people are never just jokes. It always informs the public and trickles back down to harming actual trans people. And what's crazy is that anyone who says, oh, they're just jokes, they have to also somehow say, oh, that the fact that legislation is being passed after there's been an environment created where these jokes are not only comfortable, but people are seeking them out. That legislation, that's just a coincidence. And it can't be. It just can't be.

SPEAKER_04 1:47

It does the bidding for the policy to happen. It makes it normal. And also, like what I don't think lands always for people as trans people are so othered culturally and then in policy, people don't realize that they are just the scapegoat to climb whatever ladder of manufactured hierarchy to get to you, whoever you are.

SPEAKER_00 2:08

Hey, guess what? They didn't take your job away from you. They aren't the reason your hours got cut at the plant, they aren't the reason that big company didn't decide to move to your city. They aren't the reason you don't have health care, they aren't the reason you don't have public transportation. They actually experience harm by not having those things to an even greater degree than you. As a person who's not trans, as a person who doesn't know a trans person, you are experiencing arguably one-tenth of what these people are going through in America right now. It's just, it's, and that's like, especially as a comedian right now, as a queer person, and I know like I harp on this a lot, but if you can at least say, hey, these individuals who I love, some of these individuals who are so helpful and so philanthropic and give back to their community 100fold, if you think these people are bad just because they put on different clothing than you, just because their identification, their expression is a tiny bit different than what you're used to, what are you doing with your time? I just listed all those problems that are much bigger and much scarier. And people are like, nah, it's that very tall, confident lady. That's why I'm messed up.

unknown 3:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:24

And you're like, it can't be her. She's taking care of three kids she adopted because their parents kicked them out. It can't be her.

SPEAKER_04 3:31

Yep. You really call out um this nonsense in comedy a lot. I do. I think it's because you are such a studious comedian that you come so correct to the conversation that you seem to feel strong enough to call it out and have more and more.

SPEAKER_00 3:51

I feel I feel lucky that that is a perception of me. I I mean, I went to grad school, I was a graduate teaching assistant for three years. I got a BFA and an MFA in acting. So I do love craft and I love performance, but I also love intention and textual analysis. And also I love being able to say, okay, what was the reason behind that? Or like, what could I guess might be the reason behind that? So whenever I'm kind of calling out people who are weird about gender performance and gender identity and expression in stand-up, I just feel like I'm, if no one else is gonna do it, I should do it. What are my trans and non-bodnia friends gonna think if they know I have these convictions and these feelings, but I never say anything? It's a weird, it's it's a very weird place to be in because as we've discussed right now, if like a young queer person, a young trans person, actually a young, a young cis woman, if anyone who was kind of falling into a category of not being a straight white guy, if they asked me five years ago, oh, is stand-up really misogynistic, transphobic, homophobic, I go, eh, it there's some, there's definitely some, but guess what? We we're gonna have some fun. You know what? I'm gonna make sure you know where to go, you know where not to go, and we're gonna have some fun. If the same person or if the same version of that person came up to me right now and asked me, I go, it's very hard. And it's gotten worse. And the internet has enabled some of people's worst impulses and kind of given life to monsters where you can just destroy someone in the comment section, whether that be YouTube or Reddit or Twitter. It's very, it's very hard for me to tell people, oh, you should do stand-up unless they absolutely love it. I always say if you love it and you really want to do it and you want to do it for a long time, you want to excel at it, and you want to crush, do it. It's hard for me to tell people to do it to learn because the process of them learning might be such an intense hazing and hazing and bullying from you know, all of these evil internet trolls. I don't know if I want to put them through that. I don't know if I want a young, queer person to have to go to a comedy club and listen to people laugh about some of the most evil shit and then think, oh, should I even go up? Oh, this crowd does not seem like they would be nice to me. So it's a it's a very weird place to be in right now.

SPEAKER_04 6:11

Can I walk it back to two things? Yeah. One thing you said is five years ago. That's what you said, right? Yeah. The span of the last five years has gotten so it has the the violence in discourse and on the scene has cranked up so hard.

SPEAKER_00 6:25

Yes, 100%.

SPEAKER_04 6:26

I I I agree. And this past like the hour that I'm working in tour that I've been working and touring now since October 2025 is like when I started like putting it all together. Uh, when I was going to specifically clubs in New York, I was like, oh ouch.

SPEAKER_00 6:43

Oh fucking ouch. And sometimes you're like, okay, maybe I'm working on this. And then sometimes you're like, okay, maybe this is still crunchy and I'm figuring something. But then sometimes it's not your joke that informs you that there's this, that there's been a spike in all of these isms. What informs you is someone else's material doing very well in front of a crowd that might have liked you. You go, okay, they liked me. Hell yeah. But then you see someone either before you or after you, and you go, ooh, ooh, wow, okay. Don't love that they're laughing at that.

SPEAKER_04 7:25

And then also you said five years ago, and then also you said the internet, that it's like so you're gonna get bullied on the internet. Just a couple things I want to pick apart there. One thing is the algorithm.

SPEAKER_00 7:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 7:35

It's not even the internet. Remember what the internet used to fucking mean?

SPEAKER_00 7:39

That's I'm glad you made that clarification because specifically it turns into this kind of compounding exponential cycle where whatever you were even close to, it just flings you there. And there is a bit of a slant toward it's tilted towards the right so that everyone kind of falls that way. You watch two, you watch two semi-conservative videos. The next video is like, abortion's murder. And you're like, whoa, whoa, oh my gosh. I watched a video about working out, I watched a video about making a smoothie every morning. How did I get here? You watch two videos about making your own breakfast. The third video is women should stay home. I don't know why you want to vote. Be a mom.

SPEAKER_04 8:13

You know what I mean? Insane. Yeah. It's fully insane. And it's also like, even the algorithm itself wasn't this violent five years ago.

SPEAKER_00 8:20

And I think like there's a little bit of history when it comes to like the lawsuit that was settled with Meta, when they were definitely pushing people into like political, um, sort of these very extreme political corners. And I hate to be this person, but one extreme political corner, they want everyone to have Medicare for all. Another political corner, kind of almost black and brown people did. So it even that to have to describe them as equal, you're already playing a game. That's right. You're already playing into the game. Yeah, that is dangerous.

SPEAKER_04 8:52

Right, right. Yeah, it's like I keep having to sort this out for myself because the my memory is hazy. Yeah. And it's specifically hazing our memories. The short form content is burning my fucking brain. Do you like turn it off? I started turning off my phone for Shabbat Friday night to Saturday night.

SPEAKER_00 9:12

Okay. I I when I'm when I'm at the gym, I'll turn off some of my coverage and then what's coverage? I'll turn off like the the Wi-Fi or the cellular network. Sometimes if I just want the gym to be just my downloaded music and just me and just, you know, at the end, of course, a selfie. But like 100% not trying to get internet y because I like if I have to be in the gym for like an hour, I cannot look at my phone. The phone will suck 15 minutes from you so fast. You'll be like, oh no, what happened? So I'll sometimes do it then. And one of the best ways to kind of stay off your phone, and this sounds silly. If I'm on stage, if I'm on stage, I can't be on my phone. If I'm on stage, I'm not on my phone. If I'm hanging with people backstage, I'm not on my phone. If I choose to hang out with comics who I love after a set, not on my phone. If I choose, when I choose to go on tour, I'm not on my phone, you know, two and a half hours out of the night between the two shows, in between the hangs, and between meet and greet. So that's one thing.

SPEAKER_04 10:14

And it keeps you in the real world engaging with people that you know in your community and new people. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:19

Which is lit. And guess what? Those people then they get their phones out, take a picture, say they enjoyed the show. And then when you go back to your phone, you got all this dopamine because people are like, oh my gosh, this show was great.

SPEAKER_01 10:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:31

Oh my god, and guess what? Hell yeah. Like that's to me, that's a you know, it's a it's a semi-okay reward system. But the algorithm for me, and I really have noticed this, the algorithm for me, because it is stand-up, but because it's also like progressive and queer and black and silly, you'll see stuff like that. Your algorithm. My algorithm, copy. You'll see it like butt up against each other. So you'll see, you'll see all of the wonderful queer people and trans people who I follow and listen to and watch and support. You know, I'll see a hilarious video from Dominique Morgan, this phenomenally smart, talented, insightful trans woman. And then you'll see some stand-up comedy that's horrible about trans women. And you'll go, oh my god, crazy. You'll be like, I gotta, it's in the it's truly intellectual whiplash. You're like, what is happening? And then the crazy part is that I have to go, no, no, no. I enjoy stand-up, and I also love and affirm all of my friends and people who exist in this world a little bit different than me. I, there are a lot of people like this. So what scares me is that some of these people might not even know that this shit isn't okay because they're like, no, I love trans people, and I love all these evil jokes about trans people. And I go, no, you can't. It's just it don't work. Because once again, like I said at the top, these jokes ain't just jokes. Right. These jokes create a consent or a permission to eventually someone say, we shouldn't have them on TV. Actually, we shouldn't have them in our neighborhoods. You know what? We don't need them in any neighborhoods. It's that escalation that gets, you know, scary for me.

SPEAKER_04 12:06

Um, you know, you you uh are so um you're so precise with your words. That's why you're such a good stand-up. I try. And you were you just said a phrase before about gender performance. And for someone who um, you know, you're you're so uh you do your damn work and give a uh just such a good damn show when you do stand up and you're hitting the fucking gym, your masculinity is secure enough that you're calling out these people.

SPEAKER_00 12:36

Oh, 100%. I my one of my favorite things in the world, one of my favorite things in the world is to like be musly and kind of faggy and also be good at stand-up, but also be critical of stand-up. And I do think that I am lucky enough that like the bona fides or like my credentials, the the kind of things that people question if you make fun of this stuff, the list is usually like, well, Jay, who are you to make fun of stand-up comedians? Oh, you're a pretty good stand-up comedian. Well, Jay, who are you to make fun of these alpha guys? Oh, okay, I saw this alpha. You actually do look good. Oh, Jay, who are you to make fun of these, you know, thought leaders? Okay, well, Jay, that was well put. I I try my best to always plan a counter. And sometimes, you know, that gets into like, oh, well, like there's a certain measurable and objective level of success that if you're a detractor from what I say, you can say you don't like my stuff, you can say I'm not funny, you can't say I'm not fairly successful at stand-up comedy and fairly successful at the internet and fairly successful at uh at articulating my thoughts around these things.

SPEAKER_02 13:40

Right.

SPEAKER_00 13:40

You can say you don't like it, you can say it's not for you, you can say I'm kind of mean, but you can't say uh I didn't do the damn thing. Like that's right.

SPEAKER_04 13:48

And also it's like it's you're not mean. Like these people are causing real harm. We were talking about Yeah, they're mean. I'm not mean. Right. I'm calling up people Right. Right. Uh like we were talking back when um the uh Joe Rogan and Andrew Schultz.

SPEAKER_00 14:03

Andrew Schultz, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 14:04

I'm always like Schultz? No, no, no, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:06

It's a phantom T. It's not there.

SPEAKER_04 14:08

Yeah, it's a phantom uh uh it's like a fake Jew thing where I'm like it's it's just uh Germanic.

SPEAKER_00 14:14

It's right, it's not that's Jewish, it's just Germanic. But like Rogan, Schultz, Pincliffe, Theo. Um Theo's Theo's that's so frustrating.

SPEAKER_04 14:24

I think this whole thing, I think the thing of um are you bad or are you dumb? I think they're I think these people know exactly what they're doing. I don't think they're dumb.

SPEAKER_00 14:32

I and you know, and you know what I'll say? I think I think I think a couple of them are shrewd. I think sometimes dumb is so general. I want to say some people are shrewd when it comes to business, when it comes to this, when it comes to this, when it comes to this. I think there'll be blind spots in these kind of like areas of cultural ignorance where they will kind of really get they'll get like fleeced. And I think I think a perfect example is that I I know for a fact that Joe Rogan has business savvy. I don't know if he is smart enough to understand not what he's saying, but how he's starting to look. There's a you know what I mean? I think he's smart enough to know what he's saying. I don't think he's taken that extra step of going outside of his body and going, ooh God, not I feel bad for what I said, but shit, I'm looking like a huge dummy. Yep. I gotta rectify this. Yep, I need to fix this a little bit because that's the final missing step. And because as a woman, as a queer person, as a black person, as a Jewish person, as anyone who's other, one thing you have to do a lot of the times is step outside of yourself and say, wait a second, how is greater society gonna perceive this thing I said or this thing I did? And by greater greater society, we mean straight white men. And some of these straight white men have never had to go, wait a second, they've never had to do that thought exercise. So maybe Theo's not as stupid as I like to say he is, but he definitely hasn't taken the final step to recognize that if you say, Oh, who's responsible for this? I who's responsible? You can't have dinner with Jared Kushner and Ivanka, and you can't have JD Vance on your podcast twice.

SPEAKER_04 16:24

Didn't he say Nick Fuentes was brave for saying anti-Semitic stuff? And honestly, it's for everybody like in who knows human rights, to be anti-Semitic is to be anti-Palestinian. Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 16:39

If you know anything about the history of the region, if you know anything about grifters like that, that's right, it is wild to ever say Nick Fuentes is brave. You can say he's stupid, you can say you don't like his shit, you can say he's incendiary. You could even say, unfortunately, caveat, unfortunately, he is popular. For you to say he's brave, and maybe Theo was doing it in that way that a lot of people do now where they're casually kind of assuming that these kind of voices get taken out. But guess what? These voices don't get taken out now, they get highlighted and they get maximized, they get turned all the way up. So, like, for him to say that and think it's kind of funny, but then also be like, I don't know who's killing all these precious brown babies. I'm like, do you think that avowed racist cares about brown children? And I I don't think that he does. And I don't think that you do genuinely. Maybe you do because you go, Oh, what's this feeling? I don't know what happens to my heart when I see bloody bodies on the news every day. Okay. When I see people experiencing that's true, you know, a genocide. I think there's a there's a thing that happens to him when he goes, How do I process this? But then he always loops back around to being like, but you know, this Trump guy. Kind of, kind of funny. And you go, man, so you didn't take that extra step to be like, oh shit, this isn't like a fun little, this isn't a there are a lot of people in this world who are not removed from the harm that this administration and this cultural movement over the past years has caused. There, and he is one of the people who is very safe from all of it in every way. And that's kind of the one thing you see amongst the guys we just listed, whether it be Joe, whether it be Andrew, whether it be Theo, whether it be Tony Henchcliffe, you see a very specific protection that they have from ever being harmed by this. And when I say protection, I don't just mean racially, I don't just mean because they're men, I don't just mean because they're conservative, I also mean because they're all millionaires. So the poor people who listen to you, the poor people who pay for your Patreon, the poor people who gave you enough listeners that Spotify could give you $250 million, those poor people are fucked. Bad. Right now, bad. And you are insulated from that.

SPEAKER_04 19:03

And when they were walking back, those group of men walking back because ICE was executing Americans in broad daylight, and they were saying, I didn't know this was gonna happen, I didn't know that was gonna happen. I I don't buy that. Oh no. Yeah, absolutely knew it was gonna happen. No, and you caused it. By the way, that was never that conversation or that talking point among them never went that far to say I contributed to this, ever.

SPEAKER_00 19:26

You know what I will even say is one step further. The reason they also felt very guilty is because the reason that Renee Good and Alex Paretti are dead is because a YouTuber got on YouTube, went to Minneapolis, stirred up a bunch of shit regarding East Africans and Somali immigrants, and that was a hornet's nest that then stirred up the Trump administration, be like, oh, we're gonna send more very untrained, dangerous ICE agents there. And that YouTuber is their progeny. That YouTuber, Nick Shirley, only exists because of Joe Rogan, because of Theo Vaughn. That's the only reason that YouTuber was doing that man on the street fake scam, you know, wannabe journalism. That's the only reason.

SPEAKER_02 20:07

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00 20:08

So they have a direct connection to this, it's not distant for them. That's also probably what they're feeling. They're like, shit. Fuck. It's the feeling of when someone goes to your show and they say, Hey, I really like what you do. And then you see them do something horrible and you go, Whoa, if that person is my fan, yuck. What did I do to make them think this was cool? They're having that reaction to a degree because what they're saying is, oh my God, what I've been doing, sort of unapologetically, inspired someone else. Basically, if I'm the newsroom, they wanted to be some in-the-field reporters reporting back to home base because they saw my reach and they saw what I was kind of talking about from a scam standpoint, and now that person is causing direct harm to white people, to you know, middle America. Minneapolis is not Minneapolis is not this thing that happened randomly, it happened because of the death of expertise, fake, shoddy podcast shit, journalism. So it goes Joe Rogan The Ovan, Nick Shirley, now we have two dead Americans on camera. I mean, I'm of that opinion. As a comedian, as a comedian, if you were to, if Alana, if you were to say, What? I have no influence on society. I have no influence whatsoever. What are you talking about? These are just silly little jokes. How could you even say I'm influential? I can't be that powerful. But if I told you that people are still in 2020, 2026 saying, What am I, a child bride? You'd be like, Oh, okay, well, I kind of did do that. That you know what? That actually is my influence. Right. You Would be a liar if people if people said, Hey, I created this amazing two-hander comedy about these girls trying to figure themselves out in the big city and it's silly and it's irreverent. If you saw that and that shit was like full on evil and turfy, you'd be like, Whoa, this is not in the spirit of my work. But they can't even say that.

SPEAKER_02 22:21

Right.

SPEAKER_00 22:21

So, like, if you were, if I'm if I'm Joe Rogan, if I'm Theo Vaughn, I have to basically disavow what Nick Shirley's doing. But like, they never want to do that. They didn't. They didn't. They didn't. Right. You know, like put it. They'd be like, that's a scam artist. He's an idiot. He's like actually really hurting kids. Instead, they're like playing the clips on their podcast.

SPEAKER_04 22:39

Nick Shirley's clips. Yes. God damn.

SPEAKER_00 22:42

I see. It's just it's this weird sort of like feedback loop, too, where then like, let's say Nick Shirley gets one thing semi-close to accurate. And the one thing is like there is some misappropriations of funds in this city by some people. Holy shit, you know what he left out? The fact that it was some white lady misappropriating the funds. Because what happens when you say, oh, someone's like taking taking advantage of government assistance, people instantly go, black people and immigrants. They never go, oh, this white lady, because they don't even like, they don't even like talk about the fact that like if you're one of these people goes, oh, and everyone's on government assistance. If you live in America and the majority of the people here are white, it stands to reason that a lot of white people are on government assistance. Yeah. It's like I don't even know if they take that intellectual step.

SPEAKER_04 23:38

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I love it because it makes me feel less emotionally connected to the news and more like I'm a person on a rock that's hurling through space, and I'm just I'm just observing like what the news cycle is today and sifting my way through to have some semblance of reality. And what I love about ground news is that it's subscriber funded. So we are all contributing to sharing a reality together. So let me look at this. Um uh there's this headline Trump renews threat to New York Times over Iran coverage. Okay, that's absolutely insane. But let me go to ground news to feel less insane. So I'm gonna go down and organize this sort and filter through left. Let's see what's up with the left. Uh newer from Miami. Trump threatens New York Times over treasonous Iran analysis. Okay, thank you for single single air quotes. New Republic. Trump calls out New York Times treasonous, threatens to expand his lawsuit. Didn't realize there was a lawsuit. This helps, this gives me helpful context. 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They're so creative about it. Ugh, dude, this cookie topping and like the whippedness. I'm like, what is this even? Oh so good. You gotta try it. And um it's called Straw Bay Short Cake. It's coming out right now. Perfect just in time for summer. Listen, you can find Ben and Jerry's at your local grocery store, bodega, convenience store. But if you're looking for these exact flavors, go to their flavorfinder at benjerry.com. I love how they keep it like tight. They're like not Ben and Jerry's, Ben Jerry.com Beach. But you know what I appreciate that you're doing, that like that you're able to do, and also like you're able to take in more than I can. Like the Nick Shirley thing, I've like heard that name, but I can't.

SPEAKER_00 29:17

Oh no. You're so blessed that you don't have to take up space in your brain with this. I I consider yourself so lucky.

SPEAKER_04 29:23

You have to what out of OCD? Like I have to know, I have to know.

SPEAKER_00 29:25

It's evil. I'm like, I accidentally just soak it all in. Like, I'm like making the connections in my brain, and then it's terrible. But you consider yourself so lucky you don't have to think about making it.

SPEAKER_04 29:35

I appreciate it though, because also it's like um, you know, there's just a sorting out that has to happen. And it is, it is burdensome that you have to be a leader in this way. I I I I can't take this stuff in, but I have like a like a you know, instinct for it. And like what you're saying, I'm like, that adds up to the thing I was feeling. I get it, that adds up to the thing I was feeling. I am sorry that you have to hold it all. It's fucking painful and toxic.

SPEAKER_00 30:02

Um you know what's so funny though? I I like whenever there's like a good connection to be made though. Right. I like there's the resistance to like knowing all the evil stuff, but there is the kind of joy when you go, this is connect. Okay. Yes. This will actually help me tell people why this is fucked up. Both of these points.

SPEAKER_04 30:24

That's right. And it also maps out to your stand-up. It maps out like writing for um The Problem with Jon Stewart, you know, like being able to make these connections. This just being a gift, a set of skills and a gift that you have to take it in, not go insane and make the connections. But something that I think that that um painful gift is affording you is being able to hold the humanity of these people. The fact that you're talking about like this swirl in their hearts and they're feeling something, like that's um that's a piece that I lose. And I think that and I'm like, they're monsters.

SPEAKER_00 30:59

I lose it too.

SPEAKER_01 31:00

I lose it quite often.

SPEAKER_04 31:01

But like to remain, you know, what we had um James Talarico on the podcast, and he's so legitimately truly Christian. We're talking so much about faith. And I was we were we were kind of talking about like demons and all this, and we kind of broke it down to being like, no, these are human beings. Yeah, and it's very useful in the fight because it's just human beings. They actually want to dehumanize themselves.

SPEAKER_02 31:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 31:23

And they do so successfully because they're all looking so crazy, and they're not like they're not looking like human beings. They they are looking like Dick Tracy characters from the early 90s videos.

SPEAKER_00 31:34

So many extra hormone. It's that's I mean, we talked about that last night. It is funny to be like, these trans people are crazy. Anyway, I need my testosterone shot now.

SPEAKER_04 31:45

I'm like, and how would you define gender-affirming care? Exactly. I would imagine thickening your neck with hormones as gender-affirming care.

SPEAKER_00 31:53

Imagine being like, I'm so sick of these trans women using the bathroom as you pull down your pants to get a tea shot in your butt. That's crazy.

SPEAKER_04 32:01

It's so crazy.

SPEAKER_00 32:02

And it's it's you go to endocrinologists more than these girls do.

SPEAKER_04 32:05

That's right. You are in the doctor's office more than the dolls. And it's part it's partially like what's giving you millions and millions of dollars. You're fulfilling this um this poster. You're becoming the the figure on the poster to make so much money. And for your for that preoccupation to be with trans girls who are being so violated at every level, and trans men to be violated on everyone.

SPEAKER_00 32:28

And the and the wild part about that is these men, not only do they understand the power of men in a sexist society, they understand it so much that they weren't satisfied being a kind of normal man. This is it. Uh-uh. I can't, in the spectrum of male, right? They had to take it all the way over because they understand your proximity to this alpha male masculine acme, this zenith, you have to be here or else you're not as respected. So, wouldn't it stand the reason? Anyone who is over here on this side of this gender spectrum, don't you understand they're experiencing harm in a way that you never will? Because you understand if you know the payoff for being more manly in society is I get more stuff, then from a math standpoint, wouldn't this reaction be equal and opposite? The payoff for being more womanly in society is you get less stuff.

SPEAKER_04 33:25

But I I this is the bad or dumb thing. And I'm like, I think they're bad. I think these are these are and you know, I think also they can be both.

SPEAKER_00 33:31

As a bisexual, you can be both.

SPEAKER_04 33:34

I think also like um another like uh framework of looking at it is that they are unwell. They're very sick. And that's actually very humanizing. And not the thing of mass shooters then being like, it's a mental health crisis. And I don't mean that. I'm like, these are harmful sick people who need to be uh who need like there needs to be retribution for their actions and they also need to be treated so they don't keep hurting people in the world.

SPEAKER_00 33:58

And I think there has to be, it's not gonna be me. There has to be a person that is able to make fun of them and also talk to them. I don't know if I'm I'm the I'm definitely a person to make fun of them. I don't know if I'm the person to talk to them. Sometimes I used to think, oh yeah, there was a part of me, even I'd say up until this past year. No, no, no, I'd say maybe 2023. 2023 is kind of when I gave up on ever really wanting to do it. And I have a joke about it. There was a part of me that said, you know what, Jay? If ever presented with the opportunity to go on Rogan, what I would do is I would say yes, and I would talk about bears, I would talk about uh prehistoric animals, I would talk about cryptids, I would talk about, you know, exercise science, I would talk about my favorite bodybuilders, I would talk about my favorite WWE moments growing up, and I'd do all of that stuff. And then at the end, I'd go, hey, and I also love trans people. And there would be this beautiful moment where he'd be like, okay, if he can hold space for all this stuff that I love, and if we can talk for two and a half hours about all this stuff, we can go on and on about you know bears, if we can go on and on about how we both are like amateur primatologists and we love apes, we love animals. Oh, you meant the animal. When it comes to bears, I can talk about Burton Tom Segura if I want to, but there is a level, there is a level of hope that I like had in my heart. I was like, you know what? He's gonna be like, okay, Jay, what should I do? But it's just gone now. I don't know. Like, maybe there will come a day, and this is like me being honest with you and not being silly the way I am sometimes on the internet. Maybe there will come a day in the next couple years where, you know, he's apologetic enough and he feels enough hurt and pain that he's like, hey, I want to like talk to some queer people and trans people on this pot. Like, I I don't know. I don't know, but there was that part of me that thought, oh, I could have a really cool animal and exercise and kinesiology chat with Joe and talk about like talk about so many things that we have a shared interest, but I could talk about stand-up, I could ask him what what Mitzi was like. I can do all these things that really that really would show just how much shared interest we have. And then kind of Trojan horse in the plea, please be nicer to my trans friends. I thought I could right now, I don't know if that's the case. Who knows? But that's like that was a hope I held on to for a very long time. And I don't even talk about that much. But now I just have a joke that starts off with a little bit of that about if I would do Joe Rogan or not, and now it turns into something else very silly, very funny. But yeah, that was like a real feeling I held on to for a very long time.

SPEAKER_04 36:57

Um like as friends, we map shit out a lot, you know. Like we sorted.

SPEAKER_00 37:02

We have these talks a lot. People, this this talk happened yesterday and a couple weeks ago with no cameras.

SPEAKER_04 37:08

Right, right. So, like, you know, I think we touch a lot on whatever um identity and and the way it fucking fits into the reality we're fucking living in right now.

SPEAKER_00 37:18

And because as comedians, like we love going. Is this because this, as a person who likes story, as a person who likes narrative, as a person who likes jokes, because jokes are just tension and release, right? We have to, because we go, how can I make sense of this?

SPEAKER_04 37:32

This is so frustrating. How can I talk about this? And to your point of the last five years, just the dial turning to the right so violently, so hard. It's like also so it's um, we have to cope and like figure out like what the fuck are we in right now?

SPEAKER_00 37:44

Where are we? And because like we, you know, as comics, we're also like I think part of it is both of us feel a little guilty about what comedy has done to America and what comedy has introduced into the both political sphere and then that political ideology and that political stuff, it doesn't just stay as theory, it really affects people. So, like, case in point, if me and you want to talk about Chappelle, if me and you want to talk about trans women being a punching bag, this is what happens. It goes from like, oh, that was a funny joke about trans people by arguably the most influential comedic voice of the past 25 years, to wait a second, oh, I want to make fun of trans people, to wait a second, oh, I want to support uh politicians who don't like trans people, to wait a second, oh, this law got passed. Wait a second, now trans people in Kansas have to turn in their licenses.

SPEAKER_04 38:44

Turn in their fucking driver's licenses.

SPEAKER_00 38:46

As a comic, you go, fuck. Because our jokes about people who smoke weed, we don't, you know, we're not seeing stoners getting more and more harsh sentences because we understand, oh, you know, things are like going towards a much more accepting place when it comes to marijuana. So to kind of do the opposite, to see that things sort of were headed, they were not there, but they were headed in a place I thought was gonna be uh continued growth and kindness towards trans people, to be a comedian and to see that happen, and to see trans comedians and to see queer comedians and people all over the expansive gender spectrum have fun and then to see that shit wreck it all, and to see trans women afraid to do stand-up comedy again. Cause like it sucks. It really sucks when you know super funny trans girls who are like, Oh, I would never do stand-up, and you go, girl, I I kind of need you to, and they go, Nah, I'm what? No, they hate me. And you have to be like, fuck. Yeah, you're fuck. Yeah, you're right. And like, even more specifically as a black person, the one thing that I always sort of like try to tell people when it comes to like thinking that transphobia is not their issue, transphobia is something that when you swing that stick that is transphobia, the first cis woman you hit is a black woman. The first non-trans woman who gets hurt by this society's, you know, continued attack on trans women is black women. The first person who gets whacked is Serena Williams, Venus Williams, Megan the Stallion, C. Era. The first person who is in the line of harm after you get all through all these trans people you hate, it's a black woman over 5'10. That's what happens because her gender performance isn't gonna be the same type of woman as a tiny white lady. So you have already started to shrink what it means to be a woman down to this very, very, very tight concept, and those black women are left out. And that leads to real violence. It leads to people saying, oh, Megan the Stalin's a man, when you should be saying, wait a second, no, Tori Lane shot that lady. Fuck him. Right.

SPEAKER_01 41:04

It's right crazy.

SPEAKER_00 41:05

Right. And Dave Chappelle making jokes about trans women as a person, and I truly believe about that, as a person who loves black people. I think Dave Chappelle loves black people. I think he loves his black family, I think he loves his black sister, I think he loves his black fans, he loves black art. If you love Erica Baidu that goddamn much, make sure people don't start insulting women who look like her. That's my that's my opinion. Yep. And that's like the hardest thing in the world for me to like get through to some people because like he knows this, or maybe he just knows black women are not treated the same, and maybe he can't articulate it, and maybe that connection is the one that's missing for him. But because society already others and masculinizes black women, you are instantly and directly affecting your sisters as a black man, and as a black man who loves his black, he loves his black fans. He truly, he truly has to, because they stood by him from 2000 and whenever, all the way through now. So it's just a it's a wild, it's a wild time to be a comedian and even talk about some of this stuff.

SPEAKER_04 42:20

It's so painful. And also, what you're making me think is like the legacy of violence against black people, but specifically black women in this country, any scapegoat that isn't a black woman is always a black woman next. Oh, yeah, yes, yes, because also when black women spoke up for Palestinian dignity, they were the first ones to lose their jobs. Yes, not a Jew who was picking up against it.

SPEAKER_00 42:41

Well, you think about this. Anytime a woman loses anything, a lot of the women who lose it first are poor black women. Right. When you say, uh, abortion access, it's always gonna be available to this country. No, because guess what? That lawsuit started where I'm from, literally a couple of minutes away from my high school at the pink house in Jackson, Mississippi. And you know who makes up the residents of Jackson, Mississippi? I think it's 70% black. So it's directly affecting black women who lost the ability to have autonomy over their bodies. And then it made its way down eventually to some of these white women.

SPEAKER_04 43:14

Well, I'm gonna end on a high note because I want to ask you two things. Yeah, do it. So we've mapped all this stuff out as we do in our friendship. We have. And I want to ask you as someone who is um secure in his masculinity, what does it look like for you and feel like? What does it feel like for you to be secure in your masculinity, to um have, create, and continue to practice healthy masculinity?

SPEAKER_00 43:40

Oh, I think one of the best things you can do is like if you're a man and if you really believe that men's voices are highlighted and kind of signal boosted, the best thing you can do sometimes, especially as a man of entertainment, is be like, hey, by the way, you wanna listen to me? By the way, these people are very funny. Millie Tamares, Grace Johnson, Tessa Bell, Allison O'Connor. One of the easiest things you can do to show. Me that you are confident in your masculinity is highlight a woman, highlight a non-binary person, highlight someone who could use your big booming man voice. They could use that. So maybe shout them out. Maybe understand that this shit is so fucked up that every now and then you as a man, you gotta pay the man tax. And the man tax, it's not just women and children to the lifeboats first. The man tax is hey, you know who's really funny? The man tax is saying, when I go on the road, I don't want to see a groom room where it's three dudes. There better be a girl hosting a featuring for me on the road. Because sometimes as a comedian, you go, I can't do anything. I can't, I truly can't do anything. Oh my God, I'm not in Congress. I can't do anything. I don't want to run for city councilman. I can't do anything. That's one thing you can do. That's one thing I can do. That's what I do. So that to me goes, Oh, you're confident. I think the second thing, and this is just as important, wear a speedo. Men put a speedo on. And the reason men don't want to wear speedoes, and this is connected, is because they go, No, but what if these girls are looking at my bits? I go, hey, what's crazy is that every swimsuit for a woman is just that. It's wild that you think they aren't thinking that when they put on a swimsuit and then they go, no, but these girls, they could wear, they could wear a t-shirt and shorts to the beach. Okay. Okay. So then when your wife does that, don't be mad. Yep. Don't don't be mad. Don't if you are saying, I don't know why these girls even want to wear bikinis. They could dress like Adam Sandler if they want to. Let them dress like Adam Sandler.

SPEAKER_04 45:37

That's right. Young women do.

SPEAKER_00 45:39

Young women, they really do. It's lit. We are in Brooklyn.

SPEAKER_04 45:41

It's lit. Yeah, at least in Brooklyn they do. Um, okay, those are two great things. That is very healthy masculinity. Okay, my final thing is how do you rest?

SPEAKER_00 45:51

How do I rest? Ugh, Alana.

SPEAKER_04 45:53

Jay.

SPEAKER_00 45:54

I wish I did. I rest sometimes. Every now and then I go on vacation. Every now and then I sleep. Sometimes I'm catching rest while playing video games. I rest by like I'm playing currently, I'm playing Mario Wonder.

SPEAKER_04 46:08

Yes. We're talking Super Mario Brothers brand.

SPEAKER_00 46:10

Super Mario Brothers.

SPEAKER_04 46:11

On Nintendo.

SPEAKER_00 46:11

Okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 46:12

Are you on Switch?

SPEAKER_00 46:12

I'm on Switch. Switch up. Yeah, playing. It's the one where he can become an elephant. He can blow the bubbles. He got fireballs. He has a drill helmet. He is pretty lit. He can like he can do some pretty cool stuff. I'm very excited. I'm like, I want to say close to halfway through. And I've been very specific and very intentional with trying to get all the Wonder Siege and trying to complete a lot of tasks because I want it to feel big and I don't want to try to rush through.

SPEAKER_04 46:42

Wait, because this game is about like world building as well?

SPEAKER_00 46:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 46:45

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_00 46:46

Well, this game, it's like it has, you mean like it's more lore added to like the Mario Bowser Canon. But the game that's actually Wait, hold up.

SPEAKER_04 46:56

Yeah. I just have to repeat back Mario Bowser Canon. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:00

Obsessed. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, there should be a whole omnibus of like the story. Obsessed. But I think that the world building games, my husband, he's playing more. So Pacopia and then uh Animal Crossing. Those are games, those are like simulator games. Some um Sam Taggart, very funny comedian. He said those are like games where it's like you've got to pay your taxes. It's definitely like you have to like go to work and stuff in the game. You have to go to someone's house and be like, is your sink broken? They'll be like, Yeah, can you fix my sink? You'll be like, okay.

SPEAKER_04 47:33

Um, well, thanks so much for talking to me today. This has been a delight, and we have sorted out a painful reality. We fixed it. And I we fixed it. I think we're holding it.

SPEAKER_01 47:42

We fixed it.

SPEAKER_00 47:43

We're hopefully gonna be able to say this is fixed by the time this episode comes out, but I think we fixed it.

SPEAKER_04 47:50

Honestly, honestly, no, joking aside, I think we have held it such that we can let it go. Okay. And I'm pleased.

SPEAKER_00 47:57

Okay, good. Good. Was that a worthy edition? No, that that's an amazing edition because it frees me. It frees me from having to be like, oh, Jay, you gotta figure it out. Uh-uh. No, that's it. Alana said we did it.

SPEAKER_04 48:08

I'll honestly say we did it. I think we did what we can do within the confines of our human bodies. Um, well, thanks for coming and talking to me today. Thank you for having me. Oh, Jay Jordan. So good. So, so, so good in so many ways. I hope you enjoyed that conversation as much as I did having it. Um, this has been an exclusively human-made production. This has been a Star Pix production. I want to thank the creative team who helped me get here today. And that's David Rooklin, Annika Carlson, Madeline Kim, Glenis Mahar, and Kelsey Kiley. I want to thank Hilda Leibowitz for his editing skills and for just making this a package that people want to look at, watch, listen to, and see. I want to thank Ramo Ventura for his opening musical sting as well as these Gorgas graphics. I want to thank the people who made this show look and sound so good today. And that is Kevin Deming, Lexa Krebs, and Christine G. I want to thank Don Hur, the band, who made this gorgeous outro sting. Uh, it's a new band, it's Elliot Glazer, my brother, Jimmy Hines, and Derek Miro. Um, if you like this show, you like listening to it, watching it, I suggest watching it because it's so golgust. Um, like and subscribe. It really makes a difference to uh us here at It's Open. And um I don't know, it makes a difference. We're building a community, so come and join. Um, see you next time. Thanks for joining us and love ya. Bye bye. Go to groundnews.com forward slash open for forty percent off the bandage plan.