YouSaid · the spoken record

Bassem Youssef

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204
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2024-04-05
most recent
2024-04-05
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podcast

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  1. “But in general, if you just zoom out, do you think religion. In what way is it good for the world? In what way is it harmful? If there was no religion, humans would have invented religion. Because think of like the early humanity. You're like a caveman or whatever. And then you see your family members killed and then you say like, what? I'm going to be the sheet or the gazelle that just ends and perish. I need to have more important. I think with the development of consciousness, humans. Thought that they are much more precious and important than the other.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  2. “But I also have questions about whether you have a very good deal. And maybe I'll throw there a camera. It's pretty good. What year? I don't know 1998. Best year ever. Well, they last a long time. So I'm not sure I want 70. 72. I'll throw five in the mix and see how it feels. If you want to upgrade, can we do a trial period”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  3. “We pick and choose our sins, the stuff that we enjoy. It's just 72 versions waiting for all of us. Maybe if I converted you as a Jew, I'll get you 80. I don't know, you know, like we can negotiate.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  4. “As a person who tries not to eat carbs, I'm deeply offended by that. I mean, there are Scientologists. All they do is actually buy real estate. Think there's a few books written about the fact that they do other stuff as well. So even there Mormons sometimes there's some of the nicest people I've ever met, but I'm sure there's also darkness there too. Oh boy, religion. There's soaking in more. There's what? Soaking. What's soaking? Okay, so I don't know how much soaking basically like if you get into the woman. That's not adultery. That's not like, oh, interesting. Yeah, you go in and use a stick. A loophole, the loophole, here's the thing religion has a loophole. Yes, and Muslims we do that the whole time we”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  5. “Distraction. I dare you to talk shit about Buddhism and Jainism, though. Well, you know, the people who killed the Muslims in Myanmar were in their Buddhist. Yeah. Well, let's go, Jin. Okay, I'll find religion. I'll get back to you. I'll have to find the flying monster. The church of the flying monster spaghetti.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  6. “I can use the Talmudic argument that if you tie a man to a tree and he dies of thirst and hunger, you didn't kill that man. And this is kind of the same arguments like, ah, we're not killing Palestinians. It's just like killing man. And they were dying by themselves, you know? So the nitpicking of a certain narrative, religious narrative that is separate from the political context and what's happening right now, it's very unfair because I can read if you want to have a deep dive into religious text, nobody will be happy. And I can bring stuff from Detalmud and the Torah and stuff that is horrible. But this is a way, again, of”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  7. “Think he would say that the presence of a story that you can tell yourself when you're in a really shitty place, that you can go to a much better place by sacrificing your own life just the fact that the presence of that story is there is harmful. Of course. But here's my problem with Sam Harris and usually people, they have free range talking about the Islamic faith and nitpicking the stuff that makes it put in a bad light. I can go and nitpick every single religion. They are Jews there, like Ben Gafir, who openly says spitting on Christians is not a hate speech. On YouTube, and I can bring you Jews who live there, they ask, we're going to have the whole world enslaved for us. And everybody would love to be slaves for the Jews.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  8. “Has done several episodes on jihad and people should go listen to it, even if you disagree with it. But the basic idea that he's proposing is that this idea of jihad The negative connotation of it of martyrdom is a thing that gets counterproductive, is destructive to the possible future flourishing of Palestinian people What do you think of that? There's just the idea of modern. I totally agree, but like people don't wake up in the morning as helica wanted to declare jihad. Think about it. Why would anybody choose to end his life by taking other people with him and end that life? His life must be miserable. He must be pushed into that. Nobody chooses death over life willingly. One of the first suicide bombers in the Palestinian resistance were Christians. We don't talk about that”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  9. “Course by holding people in power accountable. And the thing is, it is very stupid to actually call this anti-Semitism. My idol is John Stewart. I voted for Bernice Anders. Sarah Taxler, the one who did this amazing documentary about me tickling giants. She's a Jew. She is married to an Israeli Jew. We have a good ratio because we know what the right is. They don't have to associate themselves with the action of the Israeli government. One of your favorite words jihad. That's my favorite hobbies. It's his favorite hobbies. It's my shoes. Like, what's your favorite I talk about how when a white shooter does something, he talks about all of his family, and I was always like, what if we did this for Arab terrorists? What are his hobbies jihad? You could be a comedian. Wow, you're making me feel good. Okay, Sam Harris.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  10. “Jews do not have to be on the side of apartheid Ronnie Kestrels. He is a Jewish South African and he fought shoulder to shoulder next to Delson Bedella. He was part of the African National Conference ANC. And he had an artist saying, like, I know what apartheid is, and I saw Israel, and this is what they have. And the thing is Israel, the Israeli government should listen. Other people, you cannot call anybody who criticizes you either an anti-Semite or if they're already Jewish, you call them like self-hating Jew. You cannot do that. You cannot continue doing that because we did that. When I would go in and criticize the Islamists, just like, oh, you're self-hating Muslim. You're not really Muslim. You're an infidel, you're a secret, you're a secular, whatever. We have the power in order to... Reform.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  11. “The thing I want to talk to the people of Israel. What is Israel doing right now is not just Unfair to the Palestinians, it's unfair to the Jewish people in Israel. No, it is unfair to the Jewish people around the world. Because the way that Israel links itself to the Judaism, at a certain point, remember Isis and Qaidan when everybody hated Muslims? Humans are simple. They cannot have the nuances to separate So, anybody who with a Muslim name, with a Muslim face with a beard who looks Muslim, he would do it because of that actions of those atrocities. You have the power as a person to separate yourself from an abusive power, a horrible power, and be yourself. I am really worried because the rise of anti-Semitism and the rise of hate against Jews is not because of the Jews. It's because of the actions of a government.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  12. “Defense lead the people who assassinated Alex Aouda here in the United States, and they were there with their weapons outside intimidating people. This story carries everything that is wrong with the situation. You have people from Brooklyn, from outside, just because they're Jewish, they can't come and they can claim the land from the people there. Anybody from Poland, just because he's Jewish, you can come and take the land from other people. They're using technology to intimidate Palestinians. They have unchecked military power. These are not IDF soldiers. These are settlers and they have free reign in order to intimidate and to kill the people. And you understand, this is the daily life of Palestinians. Not in Gaza, in the West Bank.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  13. “And on that village, like the settlers went in around the village and they sent a message on Facebook as you rats, they get out of their sewers and we're going to be waiting for you. Intimidation through technology. And then they went, Kostra have like another settlement next to it called Eodesh. Eshkodesh, they have people there who were training something called Mishmariti Isha, which is basically the guardians of Isha. And it's like a paramilitary group that trains other settlers on military compact, give them weapons and do like military drills. And they went there, like militarized and went there. And it was actually co-founded by a Jew from Brooklyn. Not even like an Israeli. And he is like one of the disciples of Meer Kahana. I'm sure that you know who Meerkana is, who is the Jewish.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  14. “I have a friend of mine. He is from Palestine, he's from Loisbeck. He's American. He was born here. And we talk about, you know, we have, of course, all of this discussion about what happened. And he tells me, you know, in October 11th in the West Bank, there was a village called.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  15. “Yeah, yeah. I mean, I have so many Palestinian friends with an American passport, U.S. passport, living here. They are born here. And they talk about the humiliation and the intimidation and the harassment that they go in. It's like, do you want me to try?”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  16. “No, Gaza. Because if I go there, I have to go to the Israeli checkpoints and I don't want to go through the Israeli. I don't want to have an Israeli soldier telling me what to do.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  17. “That's why, like, for them, people from Iran, I remember quite well the World Cup that was made in the United States. And the Iranian team will play in America. And people in the audience all wearing Iranian, they hate the regime, but they have this kind of connection with the country. And this is the whole thing. You can actually love the country and you not have to agree with the regime.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  18. “Want to take revenge. I don't want to let. I just want to avoid because Egypt gave me so much fame and so much love and so much hate and so much rejection. It is a very, it was a very tumulous relationship. Very, very difficult. And a lot of people tell me, well, don't you miss Egypt? And I tell them every time that Egypt that I miss is not there anymore. It's not bad or good. It's not worse or better. It's just I'm different. And the places are different and the people are different and their circumstances are different. Whatever image you had you have of what you love is not there anymore. That's why a lot of immigrants, especially Arab immigrants, they live here, but they're there. And then when they go back for a vacation, they get disappointed because they didn't find what they want.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  19. “Well, I have the American citizenship right now, so I am relatively safe. There's a block. There's a block. There's a So much that happened, and I never badmouthed Egypt. This is my country. It has all of my marriage, 40 years of my life. I lived there. But when you get hurt so much, Instead of trying to kind of”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  20. “Oh, yeah, actually the Arab diaspora in America is some of the best audiences I have. They are wonderful, and they come from, and I do, and I did it also in the Middle East, and maybe I'll do like an Arab tour in the Middle East in the fall.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  21. “And the limits of language, and I tell them part of the show is like, I know what's a problem with me doing Arabic. It's like if this was an English shoe and I was telling you, fuck and shit, I bet you'll be ha! But if I do one swear wars, all of you will scring. It's like, why? Is it because we are ashamed of our own life? So it's kind of like, it's not just like about swearing. It's about there's a lot of philosophical pathways in this. Yeah, there's profanity when people have fun, whatever, but like it is about what does it, how do we treat our language? And I tell them, we speak Arabic as Arabs, but it's not the same Arabic. Crazy, right”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  22. “Is the problem with the show as a dialect, and I construct all of these sentences. Words, for example, an iron. In any Arabic dialect is an iron. In Saudi Arabia, it means ass. That's one example. That's one example. So imagine if you can actually construct sentences having all of these things in one sentence. So I would construct like a whole section of my show about that.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  23. “Same makeup of like Lebanese, Egyptian, Syrian, Saudis, English will be a unifying language, Arabic is a dividing language because you have 22 dialects and the dialects are vastly different. And like maybe Egyptians understand a little bit of Lebanese, but not that much. But the references Algerian, Moroccan, Tunisian, totally different animal. That's like a totally different language. Saudi, Emirati, Kuwaiti, totally different. People understand the Egyptian dialect because it's the dialect of most of the artwork and the movies, but the reference in the everyday street talk might not be... Understood by them. So now I have to go in. Talk to all of these dialects together. So I formed my, a big part of my show is like Are you guys expecting of this? We're going to do profanity and you're going to like it”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  24. “For me, 15 words. Because a very rich language. So When I did, here's the difference between the Arabic and the English show. The English show surprise, surprise, is a unifying language. Even for a group of Arabs. So if I give the same exact show. The same 1000 audience members in the same theater, and they're the same people.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  25. “Wearing nothing conservative, everything. It's kind of like very, very. So I didn't know what to do there. So I broke the barriers. I became Danny Bruce. I became a Jewish cons. So I went in and I went and I changed the whole thing.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  26. “Because here's the thing with English stand-up comedy, English standard, you have a huge library, you have like a legacy, you have like years and years and years and years of people doing comedy. But in Arabic, it's very new to us. And most of the Arabic stand-up comedy, especially in Egypt, is very tamed. This is kind of like imagine the stand up comedy scene in America 1960s before Lenny Bruce.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  27. “I thought So, when I was doing the English first, I actually had good jokes, but I was missing the delivery because the cadence and the music and the rhythm is different. The way that an English-speaking member of audience will receive it, it will be different than how I receive it, the energy, everything's So, when I kind of like got it I didn't know how to switch back to Arabic.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  28. “I'm just asking questions. I'm telling you, one of the funniest things a guy I was in Dubai and like a TV anchor came to me. Bassy Mousse, he flourishes during revolutions and war. It's like, whoa, wait, what? Dude. You're making me sound like a bad omen, a very bad omen.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  29. “So now they come to the show. And by the way, my show had nothing to do with October 7th. My show is my thing that I've been crafting and working on how difficult it is to do the first hour, the hour that I've been working on for five years. And it's all my personal story, all about what happened to me immediately, me as an immigrant coming here to the United States, finding Trump as a president, finding myself in the middle of a guns rally. Finding myself in the middle of a bombing, kind of like talking about how I got my citizenship. It's like funny stories about my origin story. So they come in and they expect October 7th and all of she is my personal story, but it's good and it kills and they love it. It's like if that kind of like blew up in America happened to me two, three years ago, I would not have people who come and be”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  30. “And then I was like, why didn't I want it faster? I wanted more. I want it now. I want Netflix deal and whatever. And then the Pierce Morgan thing happened and then I blew up. And then suddenly I'm selling out everywhere. It's like, ah, if those people came, if the war happened two years ago, I will not be ready.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  31. “Because I didn't have any other choice because I started that. And the only reason that I don't know what else to do. I don't want to go back to medicine. I don't want to go, I don't want to do that. And I don't know. And bit by bit, bit by bit, I started to kind of be better, be better, be better. And I was at a certain time, a year ago, a year ago, this is where I started to kind of like hone the craft and kind of sell more tickets and sometimes even sell out some shows and sometimes sell a theater. So like it was going and the money was flowing in and it was good.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  32. “Between when you were 45, 46 And then people are like, is this his midlife crisis? What is this? I went through a lot of pain and a lot of the doubts and it was terrible.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  33. “And it was this kind of thing that I am being attacked for not doing what I should do in their face and attacked for not being funny and not. And now I'm a feel like maybe it was wrong. And I was, I didn't know, I really, it was so traumatic that I don't know actually how I went through these years. And I blocked so many details from my brain because I have been using this technique for a while now that I have been erasing a lot of my, there is a lot of memory gaps in my brain. And I'm trying to suppress it because it was very, very, very traumatic. A lot of people told me you have to go to therapy, but I don't know. I'm worried to open the floodgates. And I'm thinking as if as I'm functional and I'm not killing anybody, I'm okay.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  34. “Big Big time, dying up there big time, and I would go back home and I would cry. And then what made it worse is sometimes. A fan. A bunch of fans from Egypt. Oh, that's the music. Ador Could see it I think he's going to drive an Uber in a couple of weeks. Of pressure, and I would go and I would cry, and then the central, oh, you left, you gave up, you were a sellout, you're a coward. Why don't you speak from abroad? You're safe now. It's like, I already spoke. I don't want to be an activist. I was doing that for comedy when it was good for everybody, but now they want me to go into YouTube and just throw rocks from outside. You know what, understand? I have family there.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  35. “And when I left, I went through a very dark side, dark, dark, dark, because all of the insecurities, all of the stuff that had been working on my head now came to life. And now I'm in America and I'm a nobody. I'm a nobody, and now it's like I'll have to do something, have to earn some money. So I started to send up comedy five years ago. And I sucked because it was my second language and I was new. And now I will go to these comedy clubs with like kids on 21, 22 people. And then I'm there with a family to support that. I'm going there to doing it for $15, $20. And I was bad”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  36. “Different kind of issue, but if you have all of that power, like why am I sitting around just playing guard for you guys?”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  37. “I'm protecting him. Why does this businessman think that he can get on his private plane and go to Paris? And why I'm here sitting not having all of these things? And there's a lot of time on your hand because you're... Job is to go fight. When you don't go fight, and when you have the lack of, that's why that's one of the things I love the United States about is the fact that the army cannot really get power, but they kind of like the army, the power is actually in the military industrial complex, which is a different.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  38. “Think about it actually an army during peace is much more dangerous. Because think about it. I don't really have an enemy to fight, but I have all of this power, all this tank. Why is this actor have more money than me?”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  39. “And this is why comedy is Specific because people say you were not as hard on him as you were in a Muslim. But I was like, Yes, because under Muslim brotherhood, we were just like for But now the ceiling was like here. So it's kind of like how can you do something from here?”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  40. “A machine that treats AIDS and hepatitis C virus and basically every single and I went to town with that because people think it doesn't really have to go to the bigger post like you're an asshole. No, you talk about their propaganda, you talk about what they want people to perceive. And it's a failure. And for that, that kind of hit them even more. Because what do authoritarian figures do? They work on two things, fear. Propaganda, and from that, it gets the respect. So when you go into their propaganda and expose them, they have nothing else.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  41. “And he said the most interesting thing ever. And say if you're afraid of something make fun about the fact that you're afraid of it instead of talking about that something. So there was a whole episode that we did not even mention CC. We did not even mention it, but the videos did all the thing. And the whole episode was me trying to avoid talking to him. And that, how the comedy was created. The fact that I don't want to be here and so he said if you will be surprised how people can relate to that because there was a lot of kind of like, oh, we love him, but we feel we cannot speak. So, just by doing this simple thing about mirroring the society. That goes a long way And I kind of try to do what I can under the military. I mean, they came up with.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  42. “When the military came in, people were walking to me, like pointing their fingers like, don't speak about the army. We love you now, but they would like that. So I called John Stewart. I was like, I don't know I don't know what to do And at that time, all of the channels were closed down. All of the independent, I was the only one left because it was difficult for them to get rid of me very quickly because I was too popular. It was kind of like piecemealing, kind of like going. And I remember, I don't know what to do. He said, You don't have to do anything, just your safety comes first. And I can't. I mean, I've been doing that for two years, and I cannot just say, bye-bye, guys. I have a responsibility. I have a team. I have people working for me. And also, I cannot just disappear.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  43. “After the Muslim Brotherhood were removed, you have to understand that when the military coup happened, it was a very popular coup. Like people loved the Egypt, the army is more sacred than the religion. People love the army. The army can go wrong. So me going against the army was, I mean, the Muslim Brotherhood was not very popular. They were popular for their own bases. But people accepted the fact that we make fun of them. But Cisi at that time, he was a god. And I used to go to this high class club called Gizira Club. And this is basically kind of like the kind of upper middle class, upper class kind of people. During that year of the Muslim Brotherhood, I was the most popular ever. People come”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  44. “Maybe I'm not because I was put into that, it's like because that toasts to your insecurities, like, I know, but you shouldn't say it out.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  45. “I can tell you something. I was so stressed because of the show, because of everything. I sometimes would wake up in the morning and I hope that my bullet will come and finish everything because I was so stressed. It's like I would love because I'm too much of a chicken to kill myself. So I would like rather have someone else do it for me. I was so under so much pressure and I remember the day that my show was canceled indefinitely the second time under the army and I was like I don't have to worry about what kind of script I have to write next week. This is, you know what? Remember when you asked me about that tweet about all of those accusations doesn't bother me, infidel spy, secret Jew, Zionist, Islamazi. That's bullshit. What is really, what really leaves a mark is the criticism to your craft and your work. You're not funny.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  46. “So I jumped on a verdict was 12 noon, 11 November, 5 afternoon I was on a plane, left Egypt and I never came back since then.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  47. “Yeah, so after that show, I did like one episode against the army, and I was canceled the next day. And then I went to another channel, did 16 episodes in a different season, and I was walking on eggshells. And then that was canceled again. And then the production company that was doing my show that we severed ties because we didn't have the show. They had their offices rated. I have people having death threats. Woke up one day, 11th of November 2014. And my lawyer said like, leave the country right now. There is this legal case that they kind of like they're coming for you. But as I said, like, you cannot, it was an arbitration case. And I lost against the channel that basically canceled me. And it's not like I don't know, but there's no jail time in arbitration. It's like, yeah, tell that to the judges leave.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  48. “Spread of power between the people. There was not like someone who would come in and just like the Muslim Brotherhood who didn't have that power yet, but they were kind of people saw that they were moving towards that. And then the tension rose and then there was like a kind of a confrontation between them and the army and then a lot of people were killed in the street. It was terrible massacre. And then suddenly I am blamed for all of that. It's like you made fun of us. So now it made it easier for people to kill us. Like, do it. Come on. You're doing that to me too. I just did it better than you. And the fact that you sided with the same people that flipped against you, that's not my fault.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  49. “Was reading my joke, and he's reading the jokes, and the junior judge is sitting there like cracking up. It's kind of like. I'm laughing, but in the same time, it's like the whole situation is ridiculous. But then at the end, I was released on bail. So I went back to my show and I make fun of that. And you have to be honest, the Muslim Brotherhood were in power, but Egypt was like right out of the revolution for there was kind of like an equal...”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  50. “So I went there and I asked, and it's kind of like a bunch of insulting Islam, insulting president, spreading false rumors. And I went there. And it was funny because I go into the building where there's police officers and their judges. And all of them are big fans of the show. Some of them were taking pictures of me, and then I'm sitting there, and it was the most ridiculous interview ever because he was asking me about my jokes. It's like, what did you mean by this joke? And it's like, nothing. It was there for six hours.”

    2024-04-05 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #424 – Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source