0:03

Hello and welcome to to Change the

0:05

World. I'm World. I'm and this is the

0:08

podcast and which we talk to extraordinary people

0:10

about the big ideas in their lives

0:12

and the events that have helped shape

0:14

them. in My guest this week is,

0:16

well, how can I describe him? He

0:18

does a bit of everything. He's a

0:20

composer, comedian, a bit writer, He's actor, screenwriter

0:23

screenwriter, now he's got a book. a book.

0:25

Tim Minchin in fact fact to be,

0:27

I I think the word he's used

0:29

is unpidgenholable. So he he doesn't really want

0:32

to be described as anything. particular, as

0:34

but he also says, the

0:36

thing I am best in the

0:38

world at in being a at is

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being a science-obsessed, pianist, singer, singer-saturist,

0:42

white. The apologies for the Apologies for the language. mine.

0:45

not mine. Thanks. Do Welcome. use that? You'd never use the

0:47

word. I you not use that? a man You'd

0:49

never used the I feel like you're a

0:51

man who's used the word before. and we

0:53

do use it a lot and we

0:55

do use it in this podcast, but we

0:57

try not to swear try not to swear podcast.

0:59

a really That's a really good note for

1:01

me. have, so it so it doesn't matter. Yeah,

1:03

okay. We have to put the explicit

1:05

language warning on warning on the... Now that you've

1:07

quoted me saying the W word. This book,

1:09

you don't have to have a

1:11

have a dream, advice with ambitious, came

1:13

from three speeches you

1:16

did to students. to students.

1:18

Just explain that. Well... I've been very

1:20

lucky in my life and I've... my life and done

1:22

some cool things and when

1:24

you get to do some

1:26

cool things, one of one of

1:28

things that happens is that happens is

1:30

a a pretend degree offer you a

1:32

at least an honorary doctorate

1:35

an honorary doctorate really like honorary doctorates because

1:37

don't have to work for them them. And

1:39

the pro quo is pro quo you an give

1:41

you an honorary doctorate and you'll go

1:43

put on a on a gown and a a

1:45

hat and do a speech the the

1:47

first one I did was at

1:49

University of West Australia where I did

1:51

my Bachelor of Arts in the of

1:53

Arts in that speech speech went of

1:55

ridiculous. ridiculous. Insanely viral.

1:58

And all in various places. all over

2:00

the internet, it got shared a lot.

2:02

And then, of course, the people are

2:05

motivated to give me more honorary degrees

2:07

in the hope that I give them

2:09

more virality. So I did another one

2:11

for Mountview, the London Theatre School in

2:14

2015 or something, and then a third

2:16

one at my other alma mater in

2:18

Perth, the West Australian Academy and Performing

2:20

Arts. And over the years, various publishers

2:23

have said, would you like to do

2:25

a book of the viral speech? And

2:27

I've sort of been a bit, that

2:29

felt a bit cynical to me to

2:31

just roll out a book of something.

2:34

But then recently, publishers said, why don't

2:36

we collect them all together? And I

2:38

said, sure, but I'll write some essays

2:40

so it's not just rolling out pre-existing

2:43

material. And now it's really gorgeous, it's

2:45

a beautiful, very amazing illustrator and designer.

2:47

And it's quite unusual for people to

2:49

be unabashed about just giving life lessons

2:52

and advice. Yeah, would you say it's

2:54

quite pretentious or pompous to just offer

2:56

advice? No, but a lot of people

2:58

worry about that. And one of your

3:01

great refrains is to be a critical

3:03

thinker and to interrogate your own beliefs.

3:05

Yeah. So I wondered how worried you

3:07

were about putting them down in black

3:10

and white and saying, yeah, that's what

3:12

I believe. I was very worried by

3:14

that and when I got asked to

3:16

do the first one I was 38,

3:19

which is not very old, but I

3:21

was flying home to make this speech.

3:23

I've spent a lot of time talking

3:25

about ideas because even when comedy was

3:28

my main focus, my comedy was always,

3:30

I always say, it was sort of

3:32

sex death and God, you know, I

3:34

wasn't doing, isn't it funny how when

3:37

you go to buy an ice cream,

3:39

you know, I'm not an anecdotalist, I'm

3:41

a, ideas, man. And so I thought,

3:43

oh, I'm still only 38, what have

3:46

I got to say? And I realized

3:48

that I'm twice as, I was basically

3:50

twice as old as the people I

3:52

was talking to. And that's not nothing.

3:55

You know, if you've had 18 years

3:57

more experience than an 18-year-old. I

4:00

thought I'm the right person to just

4:02

say what I've learned. And the other

4:04

thing I'm really interested in is taking

4:06

big ideas and making them light. I

4:09

thought, you know what, I'm just going

4:11

to try and make a wicked commencement

4:13

speech about what I think life is

4:15

about and I'm going to make it

4:17

light and funny. I'm going to go

4:19

really hard at like, you're going to

4:22

die soon, have a fun life, and

4:24

I'm, so I hope I hope I

4:26

took the... Pomposity offer with humor, which

4:28

is literally how I've made a living.

4:30

I was slightly ashamed when I saw

4:32

what you'd done. That's my aim is

4:35

to shame people. So I've given three

4:37

honorary degree speeches in my time as

4:39

well. And I fear that I've given

4:41

the opposite advice because you begin with

4:43

you don't have to have a dream.

4:45

And I think I'm one of those

4:48

people who has told students dream big

4:50

if you want. You can be anything

4:52

you want. So what do you mean

4:54

by you don't have to have to

4:56

have a dream? Well, I think in

4:58

my career and in these speeches, I

5:01

have a tendency to interrogate dominant narratives,

5:03

right? Whether the dominant narrative is religion

5:05

or a political dominant narrative, I don't

5:07

think I'm a contrarian, but I really

5:09

question everything. It's just my brain. It's

5:12

probably mostly a wiring thing. I just

5:14

go, is that it? And I've done

5:16

that all my life, and it's worked

5:18

out well for me in my career.

5:20

And so when I say you don't

5:22

have to have a dream, really I'm

5:25

trying, it's a self. It's a self.

5:27

It's a self. for people who feel

5:29

the pressure of the memeification of the

5:31

idea that life is only meaningful if

5:33

you have a big old, I'm gonna

5:35

have my name in lights, I'm gonna

5:38

be an astronaut, my mommy says I'm

5:40

a miracle, you know, I'm gonna be

5:42

the president of the United States. And

5:44

I just, I think there's toxicity in

5:46

that if it's not mitigated by, okay,

5:48

great, I'm glad that you've got something

5:51

big, but a lot of people don't.

5:53

And if we're honest, a lot of

5:55

people won't have the capacity to be

5:57

a quarterback for the whatever, or an

5:59

astronaut. won't have whatever you need, the

6:01

physical strength, the wiring in their brain.

6:04

And I think most people don't have

6:06

a dream. Did you have a dream?

6:08

Well, in my speech I say I

6:10

didn't. And I suppose I did, but

6:12

it was not how I approached life

6:15

because I just didn't believe. any of

6:17

it. I come from Perth, I'm largely

6:19

self-taught, and at no point ever did

6:21

I think I'm going to have a

6:23

musical on the West End. It never

6:25

crossed my mind. I thought maybe one

6:28

day I'll be able to go to

6:30

Melbourne and they might let me write

6:32

some music for theatre in an independent

6:34

theatre. Like my dreams were capped. The

6:36

real advice is, don't worry about where

6:38

you're going to end up too much

6:41

because if you think about the far

6:43

goal, you know, how do you go

6:45

about getting your name in lights or

6:47

being an astronaut? What you need to

6:49

do is be really dedicated to the

6:51

project you do have an opportunity to

6:54

do. So for me, when I got

6:56

asked to write songs for a youth

6:58

theater company version of Love's Labor's Lost

7:00

when I was 18, my attitude was,

7:02

I'm going to make this. just awesome.

7:04

I'm going to show them. I'm going

7:07

to blow them away. And I never

7:09

thought, and then I will get another

7:11

gig. I had my eyes on nothing

7:13

but opening night of Love's Labor's last

7:15

in 1993. Similarly, 15 years, I was

7:18

20 years later. 15 years later, I

7:20

guess, when I wrote Matilda, I had

7:22

nothing in my mind but opening night

7:24

at the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford.

7:26

Yeah, so how did Matilda come about?

7:28

Because, you know, you were huge as

7:31

a performing musical media. I was on

7:33

my way, yeah. And you would think

7:35

at that, you know, a normal performer

7:37

at that stage would be then plotting

7:39

out, okay, well, you know, you do

7:41

X number of, you know, you do

7:44

X number of D. You know, you

7:46

take this. total sort of dog leg

7:48

really. mean, I know it's not in

7:50

terms of who you are, because you're

7:52

a musician, but it's such a different

7:54

thing to do. Yeah, well, it was

7:57

actually, I wrote Matilda at the beginning

7:59

of 2009. If I had gone, oh

8:01

my God, I'm doing big theater, then

8:03

I'm going to do arenas, and then

8:05

I'm going to have my own panel

8:07

show, and then I'm going to be

8:10

Jimmy Carr, whatever, my life has been

8:12

defined by making sure I don't notice

8:14

the interesting side parts. That's the reason

8:16

I've ended up with a career that

8:18

I would not swap for anyone. No

8:21

big star. There's no career I'd rather

8:23

than this one where I get to

8:25

go, I'm going to do an album

8:27

now, I'm going to write a TV

8:29

show now, I'm going to do a

8:31

musical. And that's because I haven't had

8:34

a big old goal. Because one of

8:36

your other life lessons in another speech

8:38

is that you've got to be really

8:40

good. You've got to work really hard

8:42

at what it is you want to

8:44

do to be really good at it

8:47

is. Well, I think it's a bit

8:49

flippant. That speech was aimed mostly at

8:51

musicians. It was where I was at

8:53

the university where I did a two-year

8:55

music course, which I did because I

8:57

thought I had to learn to read

9:00

music and I failed to learn to

9:02

read music, but I did learn some

9:04

really cool stuff. But I guess the

9:06

point is... I feel like, I'm going

9:08

to say kids these days, I feel

9:11

like because of how kids consume stuff,

9:13

they kind of, they just, here's a

9:15

kid in India playing guitar, like a

9:17

frickin' virtue or so, and they sort

9:19

of get this impression that you kind

9:21

of just are good at things. that

9:24

you don't have to get good at

9:26

things. So I guess what I'm saying

9:28

is understand that it's thousands of hours

9:30

if you want to. You don't get...

9:32

My kids, they're like, it's hard. And

9:34

I'm like, yeah, yeah, it's really hard.

9:37

It's going to take ages. It's going

9:39

to take ages. But it does, doesn't

9:41

it? I mean, I did this in

9:43

a sort of spectacularly bad parenting move

9:45

with my teenager who used to spend

9:47

hours on video games on social media

9:50

and all the rest of the rest

9:52

of it. bad band and it kind

9:54

of frustrated me for that he just

9:56

wasn't better. And so I tried to

9:58

inspire him by getting him a very,

10:00

very nice guitar. And normally that would

10:03

be very, very bad parenting and it

10:05

wouldn't work. Very lucky for me it

10:07

did because his attitude towards having a

10:09

really nice guitar was I'm not good

10:11

enough to play this guitar. So I'm

10:14

going to practice. I'm not practicing. He

10:16

just played it for an hour and

10:18

a half, two hours a day. and

10:21

he still does, and he's become really

10:23

good. I think that... Because if you

10:25

do anything that long every day, you're

10:28

going to become really good at it.

10:30

The opposite thing is if you buy

10:32

someone a crappy instrument, you know, the...

10:34

the other way of expressing that if

10:36

you buy someone a bad tool, they're

10:38

not going to be inspired to rise

10:41

to that tool. And I definitely, it's

10:43

a very privileged thing to be able

10:45

to do. But when people say, oh

10:47

my kid's got a piano, what should

10:49

I get him? I might get him

10:52

the best piano. You can. At absolutely

10:54

worst in five years, you'll have to

10:56

sell it. But without a doubt, I

10:58

didn't get my first piano, physical piano

11:00

till I was 30. How, really? Well,

11:03

so how did you play? Oh, there

11:05

was, I'm sorry, I grew up with

11:07

a really old, super bad action, a

11:09

hundred-year-old pianola, right, in pedal piano, and

11:11

that was what I taught myself on.

11:14

I was just horrible, but beautiful, I

11:16

can still hear it. And then when

11:18

I was 21, my parents bought me

11:20

an electric keyboard, and that's what I

11:22

did gigs on. Prior to that I

11:24

had like a Casio on an eining

11:27

board when I was doing gigs gigs

11:29

in gigs in my late teens, and

11:31

then I got a Yamaha weighted keyboard.

11:33

But then I moved to Melbourne and

11:35

Sarah had her childhood upright, which came

11:38

with us, but I bought my first

11:40

upright piano after I moved to England

11:42

when I was 30, and then I

11:44

bought several pianos since. But I didn't

11:46

get good until suddenly people were watching

11:49

me, and I went, oh my God,

11:51

people are watching me after 2005, after

11:53

Edinburgh, and I went, I'm going to

11:55

play only grand pianos, and I'm going

11:57

to... I'm going to double down here.

12:00

So when you watch my orchestra show

12:02

and the songs like lullaby and thank

12:04

you God, three years then I could

12:06

not do that. I just went, I

12:08

want to do a song that sounds

12:11

like a virtuosic classical thing, I'm just

12:13

going to teach myself how to do

12:15

it. So I was driven up by

12:17

audience and instruments and I don't know

12:19

how to give that advice to people

12:21

but having something to aspire to I

12:24

guess is a great driver. You sort

12:26

of ran away from fame, didn't you?

12:28

You just appeared off to America. Yes,

12:30

once I got to arenas, I kind

12:32

of stopped. Why? What is it about

12:35

fame that you asked? I think I

12:37

say I ran away from fame because

12:39

it makes me look like a real

12:41

grounded, good person. And

12:44

there was a little bit of

12:46

that. There was definitely a little

12:48

bit of like I'm wondering around

12:51

Crouch End and with my kids

12:53

and you hear, my name has

12:55

all these eyes in it so

12:57

you hear, and you can tell

12:59

and the kids know and people

13:02

are looking at you and I

13:04

thought that's not good. But I

13:06

ran, yes, away from fame, but

13:08

I ran towards unpige and whole

13:10

ability to come back to it.

13:12

I went, oh wow, I've written

13:15

Matilda and that seems to be

13:17

on the west end and people

13:19

are taking me seriously. Now I've

13:21

got an opportunity to direct and

13:23

write a 90 million dollar animated

13:26

musical in Hollywood. I see a

13:28

broader career for me than comedy.

13:30

And so, although I did, I

13:32

did decide I wanted to protect

13:34

my kids from fame, it was

13:37

also, I was more ambitious than

13:39

that. Since success found you, or

13:41

you found success? Have you had

13:43

failure? Oh yeah. I mean, failure

13:45

doesn't feel very useful to me.

13:48

I've had, and it's all relative.

13:50

I had a terrible year in,

13:52

I think it was 2017, where

13:54

I had moved my family to

13:56

LA to make this film. It's

13:58

animated outback musical. I

14:01

was doing lots of different things,

14:03

but the majority of that three

14:05

and a half years was dedicated

14:07

to this film. And then Dreamworks,

14:09

where we were making it, got

14:11

bought, and the film got shut

14:13

down after those years of work.

14:15

It was like three quarters finished.

14:17

And then very soon after that

14:19

Groundhog Day, the musical, which had

14:21

gone to Broadway closed quite a...

14:23

It did a few months, but

14:25

way, way, before it made its

14:27

money back, you know. it was

14:30

not a hit on Broadway. And

14:32

then I had a role playing

14:34

Friar Tuck in this massive big-budget

14:36

Hollywood film, and that was like

14:38

the famous critical flop of that

14:40

year. And so having spent 10

14:42

years where everything I touch seemed

14:44

to turn to gold, like my

14:46

comedy career and Matilda, and even

14:48

I've voiced an animated short film

14:50

in Australia and it won the

14:52

Oscar and you know, it's just

14:54

like sailing. And to be fair

14:56

on me, working so, so hard.

14:59

once the door opened I put

15:01

my foot to the pedal and

15:03

I probably still haven't taken it

15:05

off and need to learn to

15:07

but so I I felt like

15:09

I was a big-hearted hard-working art-loving

15:11

good energy and that's why I

15:13

was succeeding and then that year

15:15

the universe taught me a lesson

15:17

which was that you you can't

15:19

polyeny your way through America you

15:21

know you will get you will

15:23

have things that don't soar, doesn't

15:25

matter how big your heart is

15:28

and how hard you work. And

15:30

how did you cope with it?

15:32

You'd have to ask my wife,

15:34

pretty poorly I think, like not

15:36

outward behaviour, I just, it knocked

15:38

me sideways, I found it very

15:40

hard to deal with the opportunity

15:42

cost, because I love what I

15:44

do, the idea that I could

15:46

have been writing another musical, I

15:48

could have been working on an

15:50

album or my tour, the stuff

15:52

I sacrificed to do that film,

15:54

I... felt the loss of that

15:56

as much as I felt the

15:59

loss of the film itself. And

16:01

of course, humans hate thwarted expectations.

16:03

So I was a year away

16:05

from, you know, Oscar nomination for

16:07

best animated film as far as

16:09

I was concerned, like why the

16:11

hell not? And suddenly I had

16:13

absolutely nothing to show for it.

16:15

And is it true that the

16:17

higher you rise, the harder you

16:19

fall? I think that could be

16:21

the case, but it's just not

16:23

how I think about the world.

16:25

It's just not how I think

16:28

about the world. especially Groundhog Day,

16:30

which I thought and still believe

16:32

to be a better piece of

16:34

theater than Matilda in many, many

16:36

ways in the ways that I

16:38

care about in terms of. you

16:40

know, musical complexity and thematic depth and

16:43

theater making in general. I was pretty

16:45

down about that. I was angry about

16:47

the film because I've never had a

16:49

boss. I don't take well to hierarchical

16:51

power flexes. Like I will listen to

16:53

a note from a studio executive or

16:56

a note from a storyboard artist or

16:58

a note from a chorus member of

17:00

one of my musicals or a note

17:02

from the sound guide monitor Engineer equally

17:04

I'll listen to the note and if

17:06

I think it's a good note I'll

17:09

take it and if I don't I

17:11

won't but in America if an executive

17:13

says change that they just expect you

17:15

to change it and so I was

17:17

I was already in a bit of

17:19

a grapple with the studio system and

17:22

when I shut it basically my reaction

17:24

was how dare you take my work

17:26

off me it was quite righteous but

17:28

I don't I

17:31

have a second, I have a metacognition

17:33

overdrive, so every feeling I have, I

17:35

have a thought about that feeling and

17:37

a thought about the thought about the

17:40

feeling, which is tedious and annoying, but

17:42

I never just feel sad. I feel

17:44

sad and then I punish myself for

17:46

being so righteous as to feel sad

17:49

and then I reframe it and, you

17:51

know, we're all doing that, don't we?

17:53

Yeah, I mean, you say your comedy

17:55

show was quite complex, it was about

17:58

ideas, I mean, you know, your progressive

18:00

values and, you know, know, your politics

18:02

to some degree, and when you're not

18:04

doing that, so obviously anymore, you know,

18:07

what's the outlet for what you want

18:09

to say, what you want to get

18:11

across, what you believe. I

18:14

don't think my comedy was political

18:17

or scientifically ranty or whatever it

18:19

was. Very godless, obviously. Comedy was

18:21

not my vehicle for my ideas.

18:23

My ideas was the stuff that

18:25

was lying around when suddenly I

18:27

had an audience. It's like me

18:29

finding an audience for my capacity

18:31

to play funny songs with lots

18:33

of words intercepted with a post-911.

18:36

sort of era where new atheism

18:38

was rising up and I was

18:40

really interested in data and science.

18:42

I started a bit of philosophy

18:44

and psychology at uni, but later

18:46

in my 20s I kind of

18:48

ate that stuff up. I was

18:50

just reading all this stuff about

18:52

psychology and philosophy, why we believe,

18:55

what we believe, and why science,

18:57

how science works and all this.

18:59

And it just was what was

19:01

lying around, I think. So it

19:03

wasn't, comedy wasn't a delivery method

19:05

of my... worldview. Like upright, my

19:07

TV show, those ideas about how

19:09

we deal with pain and family

19:12

and caring for one another and

19:14

how we overcome grief and those

19:16

ideas are just as important to

19:18

me. In fact, as you get

19:20

older, you kind of change what

19:22

matters most. I haven't had any

19:24

sort of road to Damascus, you

19:26

know, change in my basic worldview

19:28

and as you can see from

19:31

the book. It's still, I'm still

19:33

a materialist, determinist. optimist, pragmatist or

19:35

whatever the hell. Atheist. Atheist, definitely.

19:37

But, um... That hasn't changed, hasn't

19:39

it? Well, it would be very

19:41

strange, wouldn't it? Well, no, not

19:43

that strange. I mean, don't people

19:45

quite often change their view on

19:47

spirituality as they get older? Not

19:50

often in that direction without trauma.

19:52

I think mostly religions are cultural,

19:54

you inherit it, and trauma can

19:56

make you... it? I mean certainly

19:58

because of the material I did

20:00

I have contact still often with

20:02

people who stop me in the

20:04

street and say I was in

20:06

a bad situation with a church

20:09

or I was brought up in

20:11

Iran and when I came to

20:13

Australia your material opened my mind

20:15

to I mean this sounds very

20:17

self-serving but a

20:19

lot of people get de radicalized

20:22

or de radicalized is too much.

20:24

They lose their faith and look

20:26

for people who are talking about

20:28

that to give them some meaning

20:30

outside of it, right? I never

20:32

had faith and I don't think

20:34

many people find faith unless they've

20:37

got a massive hole that they're

20:39

looking to feel. So I don't

20:41

think the basis of my worldview

20:43

has changed at all, really. I'm

20:45

utterly convinced that we live in

20:47

a deterministic universe that has just

20:50

emerged and that humans that just

20:52

meet robots. How I talk about

20:54

it has changed. for a couple

20:56

of reasons. One, well for one

20:58

reason really, which is my position

21:00

has changed. When I started writing

21:03

those songs, I was like a

21:05

young man with a lot of

21:07

ideas and I was like trying

21:09

to find an audience and I

21:11

was playing in tiny cabaret rooms

21:13

and I hate this phrase but

21:15

I was sort of punching up,

21:18

you know, punching up at the

21:20

structures that that you know retain

21:22

power and don't look after kids

21:24

and whatever. Now I'm 49 and

21:26

I'm, people know who I am

21:28

and the world is full of

21:31

polemists. Everyone's a polemacist now. Everyone

21:33

thinks the way to express themselves

21:35

is to say the sort of

21:37

biggest mic drop thing in the

21:39

smallest amount of words and I'm

21:41

like, I'm out. Pilemic is no

21:44

longer my form. I'm going to

21:46

try and tell generous stories about

21:48

humans and how we all have

21:50

humanity in common, you know. Yeah,

21:52

I mean, you've dropped off social

21:54

media essentially, partly because of that,

21:56

I guess. Yeah, I found it

21:59

very stressful and I've been wondering

22:01

recently if it's because when I

22:03

talk to people about why I

22:05

couldn't be on social media, sometimes

22:07

I see them going like looking

22:09

a bit confused and I've realized

22:12

that not everyone finds it as

22:14

distressing as me and that there

22:16

could be two reasons. One, I

22:18

think I followed a lot of

22:20

interesting people who had political views

22:22

and so my algorithm's just feeding

22:25

me the edgiest stuff. because

22:28

I use social media to expand my

22:30

social group base. I was like, I've

22:32

never heard from, you know, I'm long

22:35

before Black Lives Matter, before the Floyd

22:37

Hot Point, I was following those people

22:39

when I moved to America. I'm like,

22:42

oh, they're interesting, you know, and so

22:44

I flooded myself with distress. But the

22:46

other thing is, I think I take

22:48

it. on. I think

22:51

I find it really distressing when people are

22:53

distressed. I think some people are numb to

22:55

it. Anyway, so... And that is what social

22:57

media does. I mean it floods you with

23:00

the world's pain. Well I think, I think

23:02

minded. Does yours? Do you feel like you're

23:04

being fed pain? Yeah, well totally. I mean

23:06

I use Twitter mostly for news or X.

23:09

Yes. and Instagram was supposed to be a

23:11

sort of a happy place. I know, and

23:13

that's what I, I sort of did my

23:16

strictly come dance and stuff and all that

23:18

kind of stuff. But actually that's been taken

23:20

over by people sending me images from Israel

23:22

and Gaza. And they think they're doing good

23:25

things. making sure no

23:27

one's looking away, which is... Well,

23:29

I keep wanting to reply and

23:31

say, I know, I do the

23:33

news, you know, you don't need

23:35

to send me those images because

23:37

I've seen them before you did.

23:39

But, you know, I have so

23:41

many things to say about that.

23:43

Like... there is an assumption from

23:45

people who are very very passionate

23:47

that because you know Christians not

23:50

posting these images he must not

23:52

care because the only way I

23:54

know how to care is to

23:56

post the images and that's a

23:58

slightly narcissistic thing because you have

24:00

idea how much you care or

24:02

I care. I think it is

24:04

paralyzing. I think I noticed I

24:06

was doing less good because I

24:08

was so distressed by the world

24:10

that counterintuitively you think, oh, I'm

24:12

not burying my head in the

24:14

sand, look at me, observing and

24:16

acknowledging the distress of the world.

24:18

That is ethical only if you

24:20

put it into action. Only if

24:22

it increases the amount you donate

24:24

or increases the amount of pressure

24:26

you put on your local MP,

24:28

or if it makes you buy

24:30

a plane ticket and get over

24:33

there and, you know, grab a

24:35

Medicaid kit and, you know, if

24:37

it makes you do nothing but

24:39

feel distressed, then you have to

24:41

ask yourself the question, who else

24:43

is suffering for my distress? And

24:45

if you're a father, it might

24:47

be your kids. I found myself

24:49

not okay in myself a lot

24:51

because of how distressed I was

24:53

and so I just needed it's

24:55

not that I've buried my head

24:57

in the sand I just need

24:59

to be have agency in what

25:01

I'm seeing and what I'm reading

25:03

and not let the algorithm tell

25:05

me what I should be seeing

25:07

and reading and the only way

25:09

I could do that is get

25:11

off at all. And does getting

25:14

off at all also mean television

25:16

news and yeah well I don't

25:18

really watch tele you know except

25:21

I dial up a movie or

25:23

whatever I have three apps on

25:25

my phone in Australian newspaper the

25:27

BBC and the New York Times

25:29

and I go to them every

25:31

second day for 20 minutes And

25:33

is that enough for you really

25:35

to be informed? To know what's

25:38

going on? Well, and to form

25:40

opinions on it. No, because the

25:42

world doesn't need my opinion. But

25:44

you might. I mean, you're a

25:46

thinking, I mean. Yeah, but there's

25:48

a cost benefit, right? So two

25:50

things I'd say. This is a

25:52

really interesting conversation to me. So

25:55

I apologize if I sound like

25:57

I'm preaching. I'm sort of posing

25:59

the question. is what's coming

26:01

through your news apps or your

26:03

Twitter feed, the news, or is

26:05

it the news enhanced by the

26:07

only thing that motivates it, which

26:09

is click pay, which is this

26:11

headline I'm clicking on because it's

26:13

very distressing, or this headline I'm

26:15

clicking on because I already agree

26:18

with it. So it's this extremeification.

26:20

Since we've got phones in our

26:22

pockets, basically it is forcing us

26:24

to have stronger and stronger views

26:26

about things, and it is not

26:28

informing us in a balanced way,

26:30

because it takes a very, very,

26:32

very long time to get your

26:34

head around the geopolitics of the

26:36

Middle East. And most people who

26:38

have strong feelings haven't put that

26:40

time in, including myself. And I

26:42

have strong feelings. So you're not

26:44

getting the news, you're getting the

26:46

algorithm's idea of what people want

26:48

to feed off. So while you're

26:50

reading news about issue A, you're

26:52

not hearing all the other issues,

26:54

you're not, you're just not getting

26:56

the news. So you're not informed.

26:58

You're just informed about the stuff

27:00

that everyone's agitated by. And so

27:03

if you can curate your input

27:05

and try and make it as

27:07

wide as possible and get off

27:09

the apps which really are not

27:11

news, they're people's hot takes on

27:13

the news, I think you can

27:15

be as informed. And the only

27:17

other thing I'd say is it's

27:19

not. a priority ethical

27:21

to be informed. It's only ethical if

27:23

being informed makes you better in the

27:26

world. And I've made this point and

27:28

got in real trouble because people like,

27:30

you're a privileged white guy bearing your

27:32

head in the sand. And I feel

27:35

like I just need to say it

27:37

again. Is it a moral question though?

27:39

I mean, is it an ethical question?

27:42

For example, if you're more informed, but

27:44

it makes you a worse father, a

27:46

worse neighbor, and paralyzed so you don't

27:49

know who to give to charity and

27:51

you're distressed all the time and you

27:53

shout at a cab driver, and being

27:56

less informed makes you a better father,

27:58

a better neighbor, more suitable. more

28:01

charitable and you don't shout at

28:03

the cab driver then yes it's

28:05

a moral question but you're a

28:07

citizen in a democratic country with

28:09

agency and yes you'd want to

28:11

you you want to get you

28:13

a vote right yeah and you're

28:15

an intelligent person yeah so you

28:17

you you sure you

28:19

have an obligation to inform yourself, to

28:22

be a good citizen. I'm not saying

28:24

you can't be just by reading three

28:26

answers, but I mean... Being a good

28:28

citizen, it's what I just pitched to

28:31

you is maybe you're not being as

28:33

good a citizen, it's just about agency

28:35

over what information you're taking in. I

28:37

would like to be informed enough to

28:39

vote in my electorate, and that's very

28:42

hard because you're not more informed by

28:44

reading more news. certainly not on social

28:46

media. I mean, old-fashioned media, you know,

28:48

the kind of programs that I do

28:51

and most of it, you know, they

28:53

are curated by people. And I have

28:55

much more likely to spend an hour

28:57

listening to you than an hour flicking

29:00

through a thing. That is what I'm

29:02

talking about. I go, I look for

29:04

long reads and analysis after the pressure's

29:06

gone down, and obviously you cannot miss.

29:08

the big news stories that oasis has

29:11

gone on sale, like the stuff that

29:13

really matters, the stuff that actually occupies

29:15

people's thoughts. No, but like not, we

29:17

live in this world, you cannot miss

29:20

the big moments. You can unaddict yourself

29:22

to a constant 24-hour news input. And

29:24

do you feel it's your duty to

29:26

try and keep your kids off these

29:29

as well? Yeah, absolutely. It's very, very,

29:31

very, very hard. They don't

29:33

use it like we do. We

29:35

got, our generation got side-swiped and

29:37

we thought it was going to,

29:39

you know, Arab Spring, 2012, we're

29:41

like, here we go, democracy and

29:44

action, now everyone has a voice.

29:46

This is going to be amazing.

29:48

And literally three years later, it

29:50

was like, oh, we're all shouting

29:52

each other and getting more divided.

29:54

I mean, this stat that boys

29:56

are going right and girls are

29:58

going left in America and Britain,

30:00

and it will be Australia. I

30:03

mean that is catastrophic. I find

30:05

that catastrophic. Do you understand why

30:07

that's happening? Yep. And why do

30:09

you think boys go right because

30:11

of social media? I mean, I

30:13

know, I mean, my boy and

30:15

his friends get bombarded with this

30:17

stuff. That's why. Because everyone's on

30:19

all the time, apparently getting informed,

30:22

but actually just being fed what

30:24

agitates them or what they already

30:26

agree with, right? So you click

30:28

on stuff that outages you? How

30:30

dare Trump say that? Or stuff

30:32

you love, oh my God, did

30:34

you see Oprah Speak at the

30:36

DNC? That's what you're getting. mostly,

30:38

unless you curate your input really

30:41

carefully by not being on social

30:43

media. If you're a boy, if

30:45

you're a straight white bloat in

30:47

contemporary America, you

30:49

are not seeing a lot of positive

30:52

messages about how great straight white blokes

30:54

are. There's not a lot of stuff

30:56

for you about pride, that makes you

30:58

feel good. There's a lot of stuff

31:01

about how terrible you are, and they're

31:03

just going to run into the arms

31:05

of someone who lets them have pride,

31:08

like every population on earth, forever. You

31:10

take pride away from people, it's bad.

31:12

We know that, right? We know that

31:14

by how... the British colony treated indigenous

31:17

peoples. They literally, to speak for my

31:19

country, and I find it impossible to

31:21

speak about without getting emotional, but you

31:23

took away dignity. That's what you did.

31:26

That's what we will never recover from,

31:28

is the removal of dignity. And I'm

31:30

not drawing equivalents between Aboriginal Australia and

31:33

straight white guys, but. the

31:36

proofs in the pudding right it doesn't matter

31:38

whether you agree agree with me or not

31:40

about how the messaging we're sending these boys

31:42

watch them drift towards Andrew Tate it's that

31:44

maybe it's just because they're but it's happening

31:47

and the question is what do we

31:49

do right and so I know

31:51

this isn't the most important issue

31:53

in the world but it's just

31:55

it's just something I've been thinking

31:57

about this week like because we

31:59

know what happens when people have

32:01

extreme different ideals and then you

32:03

to that gender difference like mad.

32:05

I mean the two the two

32:07

the two life lessons that you're

32:09

that's in this book you know

32:11

that are obvious there's sort of

32:13

a sort of the be kind

32:15

thing and be creative now be

32:17

kind of become a bit of

32:19

a mocked meme hasn't it you

32:21

know I mean it's ridiculous you

32:23

know where where to say be

32:25

kind is just kind of laughter

32:27

you know a lot of the

32:29

time but you mean it don't

32:31

you So, because it's this sort

32:33

of podcast and I really like

32:35

talking to you and there's time

32:37

to unpack it, firstly, the biggest

32:39

life lesson in my big speech

32:41

is be hard on your own

32:43

opinions. Take them outside and hit

32:45

them with a cricket bat, you

32:47

know. And that's my worldview, that

32:50

it's very very hard. I say

32:52

in one of the introductions, you

32:54

have to have psychological, neurological, epistemic,

32:56

and cultural humility. You are riddled

32:58

with bias. And every decision you

33:00

make about what you feel is

33:02

because of confirmation bias and because

33:04

you're affirming up the narrative of

33:06

your centrality in the world and

33:08

you're keeping yourself a hero and

33:10

you're keeping yourself righteous. The way

33:12

you keep yourself a righteous hero

33:14

is you make sure other people

33:16

are baddies because they think differently

33:18

from you and we all do

33:20

it all the time including old

33:22

mate Big Head sitting here but

33:24

I'm a critical thinking nerd and

33:26

critical thinking is all about checking

33:28

your biases right so that's more

33:30

important. The Be Kind thing is

33:32

a hilarious meme and the reason

33:34

it's mockable and should be mocked

33:36

is because people mean be kind

33:38

to the people I agree with.

33:40

They make exceptions all the time.

33:42

Well, obviously I can't be kind

33:44

to a fascist. Oh, what's a

33:46

fascist? Oh, let's dig under the

33:48

surface. What you mean is just

33:50

anyone who disagrees with you. Kindness

33:52

is only, and I say this

33:54

in one of my introductions too

33:56

about my boy. on camp and

33:58

like how you act when your

34:00

tent is flooded and someone's being

34:02

able to you on camp, that's.

34:04

where it matters. That's where being

34:07

kind matters. Being kind to people

34:09

you agree with is the easiest

34:11

thing in the world. The only

34:13

thing that matters is you can

34:15

be kind to a bigot. And

34:17

when I say that, I don't

34:19

mean that everyone has the same

34:21

capacity to be kind to a

34:23

bigot because some people are the

34:25

direct victims of that bigotry and

34:27

sure they're going to scream at

34:29

them and punch them. But to

34:31

the extent that we can make

34:33

the world a better place, each

34:35

one of us, in fact, this

34:37

is just for me. I feel

34:39

like my job is to keep

34:41

my arms as wide as I

34:43

can bear. If I can bear

34:45

to be kind to that person

34:47

I frick and disagree with on

34:49

everything, then that's the bit I

34:51

can do. That's the bit I

34:53

want to increase my capacity to

34:55

do by not being stressed all

34:57

the time. If I can in

34:59

my life, in this podcast, and

35:01

when someone hears this and shouts

35:03

at me on the internet or

35:05

whatever, if I can try to

35:07

be kind to be kind, to

35:09

people who disagree with me, I

35:11

feel like that's the mission. Where

35:13

does that leave you with, and

35:15

I don't want to sort of

35:17

flush you out on this if

35:19

you don't want to talk about

35:21

it, because, you know, you said

35:24

on Israel, you've got very strong

35:26

feelings on it. Yeah, I don't

35:28

have strong political feelings. What your

35:30

feelings on it are now, or

35:32

are you basically afraid to do

35:34

that? Absolutely not. when we respond

35:36

to Israel and Gaza, it'd be

35:38

really good if we could just

35:40

spend as much time considering what

35:42

it might feel to be one

35:44

of our Jewish friends or what

35:46

it might feel to be one

35:48

of our Muslim friends before we

35:50

put on our Israel lies poster

35:52

or our, you know, you know,

35:54

Hamas poster or whatever. Like, let's

35:56

consider the, it's just the same

35:58

thing I've been saying since the

36:00

fence in 2008. I've been writing

36:02

about non-binary thinking. long before the

36:04

internet. So my feelings about Israel

36:06

and Gaza is like, the world

36:08

does not need Tim Minchin's take

36:10

on Israel and Gaza. The only

36:12

thing I would ever say is

36:14

let's look after each other and

36:16

keep our arms as wide as

36:18

possible. Let's not let this horrible

36:20

thing happening make us horrible. And

36:23

you know, so after I said

36:25

that thing on stage, it ended

36:27

up in the papers and I

36:30

got absolutely slammed by people calling

36:32

me a racist, like it's just

36:34

the most absurd reaction and that

36:36

was what actually got me off

36:38

the internet. It would be crazy

36:40

for me to try and advertise

36:42

my opinion on that issue. Why

36:44

does the world need that? And

36:46

why do people demand that? Do

36:48

you sort of have a position

36:50

on Israel and Palestine that you've

36:52

had? Well, I'm not allowed to

36:54

have a position on anything, because

36:56

I mean, if I reveal, I

36:58

mean, obviously I have thoughts, personal

37:00

thoughts, but if I revealed any

37:02

of it, then I would not

37:04

be able to do my job.

37:06

But yeah, we live in a

37:08

world in which people feel able

37:10

and almost obliged to say what

37:12

they think about everything. Yeah, well,

37:14

in Australia there's, in Australia there's

37:17

lists. There's online lists,

37:19

including Zionists in music, is a

37:21

list. And it's basically a list

37:23

of Jewish people to boycott. It's

37:25

pretty amazing in 2024, isn't it?

37:28

I'm on those lists because, not

37:30

because I've said anything pro-Israel or

37:32

anything pro- Palestine, but because I

37:34

haven't said what they think I

37:36

should say. They want you to

37:39

come out and say it. They

37:41

demand that I hold their opinion.

37:43

and that I voice it. They

37:45

don't know whether I do or

37:48

not. They don't know the extent

37:50

to which I see this as

37:52

geopolitical or religious or that extremism

37:54

or expansion. colonialism, I mean I've

37:56

read so much about it and

37:59

you will never get me trying

38:01

to put it into 20 seconds

38:03

or a tweet. I think it's

38:05

utterly irresponsible. And yet there's lists

38:08

that I'm on because I refuse

38:10

to actually utter their shibulets. It's

38:12

not actually about opinion, it's shibulets.

38:14

It's like if you say this

38:17

word we know you're on our

38:19

team and they demand that I

38:21

say their words. So if you

38:23

were writing these speeches today, I

38:25

suppose you would have said, get

38:28

off social media. Yeah, well, in

38:30

one of my introductions, I do

38:32

acknowledge that it would be different

38:34

now, that I, so I feel

38:37

very anxious about social media and

38:39

it's extremeification, black and white thinking,

38:41

promoting algorithms. And you can get

38:43

that by when you talk to

38:45

me about where I come from

38:48

in terms of my worldview and

38:50

checking biases and stuff. What's weird

38:52

though is I have to also

38:54

check my anxiety about it because

38:57

am I just anxious about it

38:59

because that's what my algorithm's feeding

39:01

me at. Maybe I'm just getting

39:03

caught up in in some other

39:06

algorithm that's feeding me stuff about

39:08

how bad the internet is, which

39:10

would be ironic, right? Do you

39:12

think you laugh enough? You

39:15

talk a lot about your worries.

39:17

No. And that's the other reason.

39:19

I really like having these discussions,

39:22

but I'm trying to find lightness

39:24

in my life. It's very, very

39:26

important for my children that their

39:29

dad and mom aren't carrying weight

39:31

all the time. It can't help

39:33

the world. So having got off,

39:36

I'm feeling better. It's good. I

39:38

feel disconnected from my friends, but

39:40

I feel better in my life.

39:43

The most important lesson in my

39:45

viral speech is define yourself by

39:47

what you love. And I was

39:50

38 when I wrote that, and

39:52

I sort of was being a

39:54

clever ass, but I think that

39:57

I need to listen to 38-year-old

39:59

me. very, it says define yourself

40:01

by what you love because people

40:04

tend to define themselves in opposition

40:06

to stuff. And the conclusion of

40:08

that lesson is be pro stuff,

40:11

not just anti-stuff. And that's my

40:13

mission for my next decade is

40:15

to find a way to still

40:18

care about the world, but to

40:20

promote positive narratives, not just dissect

40:22

and, you know, kind of pull

40:25

down things I disagree with, you

40:27

know. If you got to change

40:29

the world with a magic wand,

40:32

how would you change it? I'd

40:35

make myself six foot four

40:37

cheekbones for days. I don't

40:39

know man. I mean, how

40:41

I would make everyone cut

40:44

into each other even when

40:46

they disagree. I'd abolish, I'd

40:48

make war not a thing.

40:50

I'd fix the climate and

40:52

take away nuclear technology. Do

40:54

you know I'd probably go

40:56

back? I'd go tell sapiens

40:58

not to farm. So

41:01

I think as soon as we started farming,

41:03

we were just on this track. We should

41:05

have just stayed as home to gatherings. Yeah,

41:07

I think so. Yeah. But the internet has

41:10

done a lot of wonderful things for a

41:12

lot of people. I think, yeah, it'd be

41:14

nice to be able to go back before

41:17

social media and see it coming and be

41:19

a bit more conscious. We should always be

41:21

really conscious of just because we can. Humans

41:23

just do shit because they can. And that's

41:26

like maybe our worst, you know, the thing

41:28

that puts us at risk the most is

41:30

we don't have enough philosophers in, you know,

41:32

arms companies. We don't say should we. Yeah,

41:35

exactly. We say can we, not should we.

41:37

We're very bad at long-term thinking, we're very

41:39

bad at looking past a single generation and

41:41

immediate need. I don't think we're going to

41:44

fix that any time soon though. What would

41:46

you do if you had a wand, apart

41:48

from join me in 64? You got good

41:51

cheekbones already. and then six foot four

41:53

would be nice. nice. I

41:55

I don't know, sort of, I've

41:57

listened to too many

42:00

different versions of that

42:02

answer to be able

42:04

to formulate my own

42:06

just yet. my own and

42:09

there isn't one, right?

42:11

isn't mean, right? I mean... humanity

42:13

certainly my industry, art

42:15

and storytelling and building narratives,

42:18

the messiness is is is

42:20

us you know you can't You can't clean up

42:23

humans. That's what uprights about, about that

42:25

scars and the the beatings we take and

42:27

the errors errors the pain we get

42:29

and the pain we cause, the that

42:31

is us. is us that he, the piano the

42:33

metaphor in upright, but he says, but he

42:35

all hacked up and hacked it's a

42:38

little bit out of tune, but

42:40

it's got its own tone and out of

42:42

tune, you play it, you'll find it's

42:44

beautiful and he's talking about it himself,

42:46

I suppose, find it's like he's

42:48

are our damage I

42:51

suppose. It's individuals and as a

42:53

species. as individuals and can't fix

42:55

it. you can't fix You just got

42:58

to be to of telling

43:00

a good story, know, telling

43:02

a a loving story. And it's

43:04

easier to say that when you're privileged

43:06

and rich and white and you know it's it's easy for me to say

43:08

you know, it's easy for me to

43:10

say, but I feel very compelled to

43:12

say it anyway. much indeed. you very much Thank

43:14

you a pleasure. Thank you for joining us.

43:17

enjoyed that if you did then please hope you enjoyed that.

43:19

If you did, then a do give

43:21

us a rating or can other people can

43:23

find the podcast. Our producer is

43:25

you watch all these you can watch

43:27

all of these interviews on the news

43:29

YouTube channel. Until next time, bye-bye.