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Trevor Noah interview for Guardian Live – full video

May 01, 2020
Hello everyone, Hello, good evening. Well, we're here for a very special night. With Guardian Live. I'm Matt Ford and tonight I'll be

interview

ing one of the biggest names in world comedy and one of the most renowned satirists on the planet. new book born a crime which I'm sure many of you have read and if you haven't it will be on sale later it's a phenomenal story of Trevor's life growing up in apartheid South Africa it's emotional it's hilarious and it's eye opening please give us a big welcome to

trevor

noah

hello everyone good night I will do it it is that way wherever you go this is fun we have our own bottles we can play a game this is nice this is nice good night how are you doing well yes Hello, thank you for come, so this is probably one of the smallest gigs you've ever done.
trevor noah interview for guardian live full video
Actually, this is big, no, this is nice, it's cozy, but, but big, it's a phenomenal book, born of crime and I'm not. I'm just saying that because I'm

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ing you, it's really wonderful and there's so many things that I'm sure the people in the audience who have read and we'll ask questions to the audience, later on they'll know it's funny. It's violent, what really stands out to me is that it really feels like it's a tribute to your mother, well that's really what the book became. You know, when I started writing the book, I wrote it because it was my book, that's what it was supposed to be.
trevor noah interview for guardian live full video

More Interesting Facts About,

trevor noah interview for guardian live full video...

I decided to write a book about my stories from my childhood, you know my heroic escapades, and then when I got to the end of the book and merged all the stories together, I realized that my mother was the heroine of my story and I was basically her sidekick. punk, you know, and I'm glad it happened organically because if I had set out to write a book about my mother, I don't think I would have done it the right way and I'm glad the pieces fell into place. instead but really that's the truth it's a story that really celebrates my mom it became a love letter to my mom instead of being a story about how as a kid I defied the odds it's a phenomenal relationship you have with she's not just a traditional mother-son relationship you're like her partner your best friends one of the things that really stands out to me in the book is when someone asks her why she wanted to have a child, she said she wanted to feel unconditional love.
trevor noah interview for guardian live full video
It was yeah, which is really heartbreakingly honest, that she made you feel like you loved each other well, that was the one thing that I shared with my mom that I talk about constantly in the book is that my mom is a brutally honest person, right? You know? and as a child, I often didn't enjoy that honesty, you know, from what I saw as parents on TV and in the rest of the world, you met people who were particularly lazy with the child and you didn't really know it. They share their emotions with their son, but my mom was honest, you know, she told me, she says, I didn't feel loved in the world, I didn't feel like I didn't have my father's love, I didn't have love for my mother, I felt like I wanted something that would love me unconditionally and that's why I wanted a child, I wanted my unconditional love and then goes on to say that then she had me and then she gave birth to the most selfish part that ever existed. he just eats and sleeps and shits and cries and you know, and then my mom realized that, you know, unconditional love was something that she would have to give me and, so, I'm eternally grateful, but I thought it was pretty funny that she never let me

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that down she goes she goes I thought she was going to love me and then this little bit and she talks about it like it's not me you know she goes I thought this thing was going and this thing in that little bit and right then just everything she was screaming and it's love me love me I'm like what about me and she's like I don't care about you and you know so um so yeah that's really the reason she wanted to have me there's some really cool stories there's really funny stories about your mom, but also I mean, scrapes, that's not the word genuine danger and I'm thinking specifically of that bus ride you're on where she literally has to throw you off a moving bus for fear that the bus driver will almost certainly kill you. at that moment.
trevor noah interview for guardian live full video
It's told in the style of a monologue, but that must have been absolutely petrifying. You know, I think a lot about what people take for granted or maybe maybe. I think what people do is how aware you are of the danger you are in sometimes, when you grow up in a society where you know that violence is always around the corner, you find that a lot of times you don't have time to think. and

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in the danger that you can be in, you know, and the same thing happened to us when we grew up in South Africa during this time, you know, it was a nation that was obviously forged through violence and violence was not under the current and and it's still going on in our country and you know, during that time I don't even think I considered it too dangerous if that makes sense.
You know, I grew up in a world where with my friends, sometimes you know if we were walking to go home we would have to walk through certain fields or certain open spaces and you knew that people were robbed or killed there, so you lived in this world where you were constantly aware of the danger that you were hyperactive. aware of it, so on the day in question when I was in a minibus, you know what we call a taxi in South Africa, and my mother basically kicked me out of the car because most likely these men were or were threatening to do it to me and there are a It is very likely that they have done us serious harm.
I didn't think this is the scariest thing that has ever happened to me. It was like my mom threw me out of a car. You know, that was like the big one. I thought I was sure there was another way we could have gotten out of this situation that ended with me getting thrown out of the car and and once again in that story, when I tell it, you know it's me and my mom. and we. I'm going through a really stressful situation, but when the time came, I always trusted her, I always knew she was on my team, so in that situation, when my mom said, run, I ran, I never thought about that, you know, it's an Instinct and an instinct that is perfected when you grow up in certain places.
I always think to myself that it's the same way you meet the baby gazelle in the Serengeti, when her mom starts running, it won't be like what's happening, what mom is going through. you run, you run, and then when you get to where you're going, you ask the questions, you ask him a lot of questions, actually, particularly about faith, it seems, and some of the great exchanges written almost like comedy scenes between you and your mother and your faith. and one thing I couldn't understand from the book was whether you believe in God or not. I think in terms of religion I believe in God to be aware of where we are.
Oh, that's funny. In terms of religion, though I found. I am increasingly a spiritual person, but I am constantly frustrated by the way religion is translated or the way religion is interpreted to help people oppress other people, that is something that has always weighed on me. when it comes to religion, so when My mom and I were going back and forth like, for example, you know about the church. One of my mom's most frustrating moments with me was the fact that she taught me to be logical and she taught me to challenge her. You know, she taught me to challenge. everything in life and when it came to religion they gave me the same leeway she said you must challenge me you must ask me these questions so I can go back and read the Bible and give you the answers don't just take what I said and so I did, you know, my mom told me to challenge her and I forced, you know, I did it every time and, um, and what happened was essentially, you know, I would question the way people use religion, including my mom, and we would play with that with that together and that was a theme that ran through our lives is the way that I would look at how you can be trans you know how you can translate the text and how you can use it differently in your life There are some wonderful examples of their belief that almost everything is assigned by God, yes, particularly when the car continued to break down, the Volkswagen car when you are on the way to I think it will go to three different church teachers every Sunday and when the car breaks down you see it as a sign of that god is saying that you don't have to go to church she sees it as a challenge from god to demonstrate her faith to be on time yes, I am, I could read it for you if I mean, if you have what I find sometimes yes, I mean, I wrote the thing, so sometimes well, that's a little different, that's what I'm trying to think about what chapter it's going to be, uh, thanks, wow, look.
On that, oh, this is fun, this is fun, what a page, this is exciting, uh, I'll get to that part, quote what I asked for, um, okay, here we go, this was the kind of exchange that my Mom and I would have. I was at that time, if you want to imagine me precisely, I was a very pretty and plump girl, with very cheeky and unkempt hair, and my mother was a beautiful black woman, very strong, much thinner than people think. , for some reason, many people say. For me, they think that my mom is a big woman, like a star, but she is not, she is very tomboyish, very thin, so if you are imagining a person, she is the wrong person.
In the picture, it's strange, a lot of people have said no. I don't know why I told you that now, but a lot of people told me that when I saw your mom's photo I thought she was completely different, uh, she's not, so you know what I think, that's why I imagined it like that. until you described her later in the book, there's a part where she describes you as Tom and Jerry, you and her, yeah, and that's why I imagined her as Tom and Jerry's mother, oh, maybe that makes sense , maybe it was a hint of what your mom was like she chased you all over the house, um, so here we go, my mom is just as stubborn as she is religious once she's made up her mind, those are the obstacles that would normally lead to a person to change their plans, such as a car breakdown. it only made her more determined to keep going it's the devil she said about the stopped car the devil doesn't want us to go to church that's why we have to take a lot of buses every time I find myself against the stubbornness of my mother's faith I would try as respect

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y as possible to counter with an opposing point of view or I said lord knows we shouldn't go to church today that's why he made sure the car wouldn't start so we could stay home as a family and take a day. of rest because even the Lord rested ah that's the devil speaking

trevor

no because jesus is in control and if jesus is in control and we pray to jesus he would let the car start but he hasn't, therefore there is no trevor sometimes jesus puts obstacles in your path to see if you overcome them as a job this could be a test ah yes mom but the test could be to see if we are willing to accept what has happened and stay home and praise Jesus for his wisdom no, that it's the Speaking of the devil, now go change your clothes and continue, but um it's basically a very simple phrase in my mom's language which is uh it means don't look down on me and uh a lot of kids that come from immigrant families that you know or if you have families who come and speak another language besides English, you will know when your parents switch to their native language.
The conversation ended and that was it when you, when my mom left English, then I knew the conversation was over, it's interesting that you mentioned that because language plays a big role. A big part of the book and that should be part of your identity within your family and within your friend group because you can speak several different languages ​​from a young age. Yes, then you can speak the different tribal languages ​​of South Africa, as well as speaking English. And there are two things that fascinate me about one of them is that you say that when you remember things, you remember them in English effectively, even if people speak a different language, your brain stores them as English and I think it's your grandmother or your aunt. believe that if you pray in English your prayers are more likely to be answered, yes, because that's the language white people use, well, I mean, you really know how to answer the questions, I guess in sequence, I learned very early how powerful that is the language.
It could be that I learned very early how powerful language was as a tool that would help you navigate and give you access, you know, to different worlds and, more importantly, to people's hearts. You know, I grew up in a country where we have, right now, we have. 11 official languages, but before they were official there were, you know, we had 11 different languages ​​in the country and, because of apartheid, people didn't often learn other people's languages, you know, even among the African tribes in the country, people didn't do it. necessarily speak other languages, the Zulus were not necessarily invested in the crossing, although they did understand it because it was from the same language tree, but then someone who spoke, say Tswana, did not understand what someone was saying in Tonga or Zulu and that and So most people spoke Afrikaans, which is a derivative of Dutch because the government, you know, was one of the languages ​​of instruction, one of the languages ​​of oppression that a lot of people fought against, but I was always amazed at how simple what was it. to communicate with people if you just switch to their language and so onYou learn from my mom again.
You know, people are impressed when I say I speak six languages ​​and I go, but my mom speaks nine, so someone underperforming in my family, you know, and my mom just did it because it speeds up the process, it speeds up the communication, so which language was one of those tools that I used and language was a tool that the apartheid government also used and I realized that when it came to my grandmother, my own grandmother was a really intelligent woman with a fantastic mind. , but sometimes even she betrayed the fact that she had been so influenced by you know what she had been taught and one of those things came when I prayed for my grandmother. she prayed in ghosa even though she speaks fluent english but she prayed in khosa and when we prayed as a family we had prayer meetings in the house and she would ask me to pray on behalf of the family because i prayed in english and you know she always my inc said like I spoke like the English that didn't have an accent didn't have an African accent I know she was like you were speaking real real English and that's why she believed that God would hear my prayers before hers. because the god they had been taught to worship was an English god, you know, God had been translated into Zulu, but originally it wasn't, you know, and I mean now, when you grow up and learn, you say, oh, wait, God no.
Apparently even English, but that's beside the point, so my grandmother was like, "You speak his language, tell him what we need, tell him what's going on and I'd say, but you, he speaks all the languages ​​and she says yes, But that's a shortcut." you know, and I remember one time when I was a kid because my grandmother is one of the funniest and most witty, but she has dry humor, like she doesn't even think about it, sometimes I don't know if she's telling a joke or not and it's very funny and I can't say it because she never betrays him with a laugh and I said to my grandmother one day I said I said but gogo I said um I said why do you think you know English and Zulu is different from playing why not?
Why don't you pray in any language? He said, pray in English. English is better and I said, but that's not true and then she said, but then why do people have it so good? Then she says yes you can clearly see her sentences. They are being answered, so we have to go pray, pray and that's why I prayed. Language, as you said, is very important and it is something that is not just being able to speak languages, but being able to connect with different communities and understand. People, that's something that's really worrying about modern politics, and obviously, in your incarnation now as host of the globally successful daily show, there must be something worrying you about what's going to happen under Trump's America: your attitudes toward the different communities, yes, well, you know.
The interesting thing is that I find that the language is even, you know, when you break it down, even in English, there are almost hidden languages ​​and that's where I always go accents. Accents are like the hidden languages ​​of the language. You know, people go. Can you speak English? but then I said, yeah, but what English can you speak? And it's not just in the United States, it's not just in the south of the United Kingdom. You see, you know that too. I was fascinated when I first came to the UK and saw how different the people would be. treated just by how they spoke in my head these were all characters from, you know, a TV show, but the British would say oh yeah, he has, you know, he sounds like he's a girl with a scouse accent, he has this accent that he has Oh yeah, not you.
I can hear that he's not, you know, and I was like, what does that mean? It was like, oh well, you can hear it, yes, it's, yes, it's from Liverpool and I thought, but what does that mean? I don't understand what that means and I. I realized that in the UK you know that people will judge you by your accent, so if you sound like a posh person, suddenly you'll know that you sound smarter or they'll see you, which I never understood, I mean. I remember listening to Boris Johnson for the first time and thinking this person seems like a rambling fool.
I don't understand, I don't understand what he's saying, but, in my opinion, he masked it brilliantly with that, you know with that. I would rather wander around the edges of this topic and then people would say oh yeah he's very oh yeah oh yeah and I was like no that's what that is, but that's the power, the power of an accent, that's the power of a language that you know and unfortunately that's also the downside because you see in America right now a lot of people are anti-immigrant when they say they're referring specifically to immigrants who don't know the language that you're specifically referring to when you say anti-immigrant sentiment that they're not talking about, you know, immigrants from Britain because Americans say oh no, no, they're like an immigrant for sure, but I often find that people are less likely to welcome you when you seem to be almost invading their language and that is what it feels like with an accent, if someone speaks like you you feel like they are like you, but if someone speaks your language with an accent you feel like the person is intruding, they are taking what is yours and you are trying to break it, it's a weird thing that happens in your mind, so what attitudes have you faced in America, not just with your comedy, but specifically with the accent?
Oh, you must remember when I first took over the daily show. It was one of the biggest things that I realized very quickly is how many people hated me just because of my accent, you know, and I understood that, like a visceral thing, you don't even understand yourself, why don't I like this person? I like his jokes, why don't I like his opinions? Because they come at me with a different accent and that's something you know, I'm glad I knew that because if you don't know it, sometimes you wouldn't know it. You don't know why you're connecting with people or not, you wouldn't realize what tools you can use to try to subvert what's happening, you already know that, but it's the same way children's TV presenters know you're talking about a different way to connect with children, yes.
I know when, when you're trying to connect with an audience that has a different accent than you, you start to realize, I realize rhythmically that there are tools that you can use that help you tune into the listener's ear without you. change who you are and what you're saying, but it's not as fascinating because you would assume, perhaps wrongly, that the majority of viewers of the daily show would be some kind of left-liberal people that people would identify as more open-minded and, without However, even they had negative attitudes towards you because of your accent, yes, but that's what people always do.
People always surprise you. You know, and I think too often we're not as self-critical as we should be. You consider yourself a progressive or a liberal. I'm horrible most of the time. I have met liberals or progressives. Where I go, sometimes in their progressivism they will be racist, but in a condescending way, you know, and as a comedian. I love playing with it. I don't think I have discovered the race. I think it is something in constant evolution, although it is a construction. We have to admit it's a construct we're still living in right now and I'm always fascinated. because of how those kinds of things happen, like I remember one person saying to me and honestly, it was a message that stuck with me forever because of the irony that it was a person who tweeted at me and said, I hate who I am.
I've been a fan of the Daily Show for a long time. I hate what you've done. Bring back Jon Stewart. He goes back to Djibouti and I didn't know how to process that information because I thought, "Well, if you were really a John Stewart fan, I know." Jon Stewart personally, I think I don't think he shares your views in terms of coming back to any consciousness, you know, that's right, so you're telling me to go back to your country because I want my liberal program to come back, yeah, it was. . It was tough of Jon to write that, but um, but yeah, that's, that's kind of interesting.
There are many cases where I've seen it, where sometimes we run into that and you know, I almost don't know what to call it. You know, I never act like I've studied this stuff and you know it's hypohyperliberal or neoliberal liberalism, whatever. I just look at it at first glance very simply and say that one of my favorite examples was a random story. for me during the euro, you know, the euro soccer championship and I will never forget that they were training the dutch soccer team and this was in, i think, it was the czech republic or it was one of those countries where they were organizing the tournament and the players were training and the stadium was empty safe for some fans and then people started throwing bananas on the field, you know, and it became a big story, oh, racist incident, racist incident, uh, although my favorite was in The telling of the story is the Dutch captain who said, you know, these fans were in the stands and they started making monkey noises and throwing bananas on the field and the Dutch captain, you know, lashed out at them and apologized to all the black players. who said hey, I'm sorry, it's racist and at that moment I said, but how do you know the bananas were directed at the black man? because there are 22 people on the field and you like, this is a training session, it's just the Dutch. team there was no one else there someone threw the banana and immediately the guy said man I'm so sorry about that and you say why are you sorry? because they throw bananas, they are racist and I always said: do you know if one?
The guy said well how do you know it's bananas for me? He said: Why not? It's not for me. I mean, why would you throw a banana at me? it would immediately go well, look, you're the banana, I feel offended for you, but that's your banana, my friend, and that's sometimes what happens, even on the liberal side, if you're not careful, it's almost a thing condescending, sometimes it is an excessive correction. That happens when racism spills over to the other side, and as a person of color, sometimes you just say, wait what just happened here. I find it interesting, but I suppose you would prefer to have a situation where people are race-aware and sensitive. to that people just being completely closed-minded and not acting, yeah, if they thought it was an injustice, you know, I look, I always go, you know, growing up in South Africa and that's what I talk about in the book, it's the apartheid of TRUE.
I know people ask me a lot of times people will say Trevor, why are you so focused on race? Why do you always talk about race? I say that because it's not going away and it's such a powerful tool that you can find at the root of many problems that we have you know that race is something that was artificially created to oppress people, that's the truth of the matter. Race is something that was created to oppress people. You can't deny that when talking about race you can't have a conversation about race. and not accepting the fact that it came about for that specific reason and apartheid was the best example of that, you know, the whole idea of ​​apartheid was that the South African government at that time needed to find perfect racism and that's why they sent a commission. around the world to study racism, you know, they went to Australia, they went to the Netherlands, they went to the United States and they studied racism to see what the obstacles were in those systems and figure out how they could implement a more airtight solution and I .
I think they did, honestly, I think apartheid was the most perfect racism we've seen in history because what it did was it managed to divide not just blacks and whites, which is what most people think of apartheid when they think of it. whites and blacks return, not just apartheid. was specific apartheid was precise worked to separate even people fighting on the same side apartheid told two black people that they were actually different and therefore tribally they should oppose apartheid told a mixed-race child a biracial child that he was superior to his mother but inferior to his white father apartheid was about creating a world where you know one of the things that was most painful for me is realizing that during apartheid you knew that if you were a person of my skin color they called you. they called it right color and color you didn't have the world you know you weren't black you weren't white um there was even a term in South Africa used colloquially and that was in Afrikaans they called it which means you were almost the master and and that, as crazy as it sounds. , that was literally what you were, you almost know, a lot of people of color were told you could be white, it's just that your connection to black is holding you back, you know, it's almost like it was I mean, we'd let you in but we wouldn't.
We know who will come in with you and what happened is that year after year in the country they reclassified people as white or black. You know, the government would come out every year. and they were like like you know they'd come out ready and say now you've been reclassified, you could be a person of color and if you became light enough and your hair became straight enough, presto, you were Now, a white person and you life would change immediately. You know the same thing could happen in reverse if you were a white person who had the misfortune of getting too tanned and your hair was too curly, they might question this and if that question was, you know it was. answered incorrectly, basically, you would become colored, imagine that,suddenly families were being torn apart by these families. being torn apart either by their own decision or, you know, by the decision of the law, but that was the power of apartheid: to convince people to blame others for what is happening to them and that is a powerful tool that we continue to see used.
You also know our modern society and it is something that affected you personally and very specifically because having a black mother and a white father, as the title of the book suggests, was born as a crime under South African law at the time, but what I What's fascinating is that there are so many threads that run through the book, one of them is definitely that you're growing up in incredible poverty, in intense violence all around you, and yet, because you're a little bit lighter-skinned in that context, You're relatively Privileged in relation to your female relatives, yes, in relation to other people you go to school with, yes, so it's a little strange that you receive favorable treatment, but you're still being held back, well, that's with what many people fight in the world.
It's recognizing your privilege, you know, it's very difficult to recognize privilege. Sometimes I think maybe it's just because of the word we use and that's privilege. You know, people always think that privilege implies wealth, health, and resources. You know, when people become white and privileged, then. You'll see poor white people saying, "Well, I'm not rich, so where's my privilege?" You know, I have no money or resources, where is my privilege? And then sometimes I think maybe we should have used it differently, maybe we should have used it. I didn't say white privilege maybe we should have said black disadvantage, you know, female disadvantages are like that because it's true, there are impediments to having certain characteristics and we know this is true in society and I even recognize it in my life and and I guess that's who I am as a person because I really try to put myself in someone else's shoes no matter how crazy that person is, I think to myself I'm going to try to think like you. trying to work in this world and you know, I realized why it's so hard to acknowledge your privilege because you have to deal with your guilt and for me, as stupid as it sounds, it was in my own family, my grandmother and grandfather treated me . different from all the other cousins ​​in my family because in their eyes I was the little white boy, my own grandparents loved me and never told me that, but for example, my grandfather, when we drove, he always made me sit in the back of the car because he used to say that his master sits behind them and everything else he did was normal with me, you know he would still punish me if I was doing something wrong, he would still ask me to go and do things for him, he still had authority. about me as grandpa, but he would refer to me with the white man's respect, you know, so it would be like mazda, please go and buy me some beer, you know, it was like a strange construction where he was going, still I'm.
I will respect you, but you are my grandson, teacher. You know my grandmother never beat me. You know my grandmother never hit me. That was something and you know growing up in South Africa, most of the time the men were away for long periods working. or imprisoned and then you lived in a matriarchal society, grandmothers often raised the children because the mothers were working and my grandmother, you know, she would be responsible for disciplining all the children and one day, for example, we were in the house I and my cousins ​​and We were playing doctor and I was operating on my cousin's ear and during the surgery one of my tools, the match I was using, punctured her eardrum.
These things happen in surgery and then she started bleeding and she was in immense pain and my grandmother came. came in and because she heard my cousin crying and my grandmother came in she said what was going on and there was blood and she, you know, panicked and cleaned up the blood and then once she realized, you knew my cousin was pretty well, then it hit. her and then and then she hit my cousin because he was also playing with us really he was just a spectator, he was in the waiting room, but whatever and then she hit him because he was the oldest, he should have been taking care of us and then She looked at me and just shook herself, she was like and then she walked out of the room and now I'm standing there, my cousins ​​have been hit, I don't know what just happened here, you know, in my head.
I'm like what I don't know, I guess not, I didn't know what had happened and that night my mom came home and found my grandma crying in the kitchen and you know my grandma was there, my mom said what's wrong. goku wrong what's wrong him what's wrong mom and then my grandson she said oh she's weird oh travis is so naughty he's so naughty you and my mom say yes you have to beat him so what do you mean if he's not? yes, you must, you must beat him that's what he is for that you must hit him and my grandmother said no, no, I can't hit him, I can't eat you Trevor, I can't hit him, she says I'm too afraid to hit him.
I can hit the other kids but I can't hit him. My mom told me, "Why does he say you," she says she because with black kids I know how to hit them, I know I hit them and then I know what's going to happen to Trevor. seen when you hit him he turns blue and green and red and yellow she says I don't know what's going on it's like I don't want to kill a white boy and that's my own grandmother my own grandmother is afraid to administer discipline because she was afraid that was breaking the law inside our house, I didn't want to hurt a white kid and in that situation I admit it, when I was a kid I didn't think about it, I honestly thought it was because I was Trevor I thought he was special I was like yeah, I'm the one favorite child, that's how bad luck works, but when I look back, I go, that was my privilege, you know, if I had known, that would be a situation where I would have to step up and say hello, Grant, I noticed that you didn't hit me even though I was a part of this, so I think it's fair that I get the same level of punishment as my black cousins. but there was no chance I was going to do that because that's the one thing we never want to admit: privilege is pretty cool, it's a sweet thing, so if you acknowledge it, you can move the conversation forward most of the time. people don't want to act like it exists and that can be a frustrating obstacle to try to overcome if you're trying to have these conversations, I mean, it's notable that you haven't really gotten beaten up more because, oh, I got beat up from my mom from part of your mother, but yes, she made up for every beating that my mark gave me not, but from other people because you find it in the book, he is a little naughty but not unpleasant, no, I never was, I wasn't even. at school my teachers my teachers will always tell you I'm extremely respectful they were like when the teacher's back was turned there was chaos I loved being a clown in class I loved doing I just like making people laugh so you couldn't tie I was depressed, but when it came to authority, you wouldn't accept any of my report cards, you would never see Trevor's disrespectful Trevor, it was just him, he constantly joked, he just needs to put in the work, that was all the teachers said. but he burned a house no no no no a house burned down because of me there is a difference there is a clear difference what happened was that I was always fascinated by the world and one of the things that fascinated me was saying goodbye to you I know I don't feel that We

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y understood it and its majesty, so I was always interested in different ways to create fire in this particular case.
I just learned about the magnifying glass and a friend we were playing with. a magnifying glass and we would know that by doing a different experiment, it really was science and what happened was you know the experiment went crazy and a house burned down in the process, but I mean, this is what science should be, ya you know, we, you. You know, think about it, you know it's like Jefferson said, it's like you've learned ways not to do it. I learned how not to create fire and that was good. I created quite a fire to be honest.
Although, uh, but me. It was very mischievous, it was a bit of horror, I admit, but a kind of charming horror. One thing that really stands out to me about the book is that you say you're a big Roald Dahl fan, yeah, and it really reminded me of Boy. his book about his childhood and it felt like that, I don't know if subconsciously maybe you were influenced by that style, but it felt like that, this wonderful collection of pranks and scrapes and adventures of a little boy who ran through the streets and got into problems, it's funny.
I don't think The Boy influenced me as much as Roald Dahl's other books. Did you know that because I was always more intrigued by the fantasy of his other works? You know, the guy was too down-to-earth for me in a stranger. I was like, yeah, this is like reading about my life, whatever it is, you just know, a tame version of how I lived, um, but it was more connected to you, you know, you know, all these other jobs, they were, you know, the giant peach, or you know. whether it was the chocolate factory and you know and the wonderful world of henry sugar all these stories that I connected with because I was able to escape really you know those were the worlds that I wanted to live in and a lot of times those were the worlds where I could also connect he was an outsider, you know, he's this lonely character who's in a world he shouldn't be in, you know, you look at Charlie, he was poor, you know, he got this golden ticket and the next thing You know he was in a world and all these other kids were nothing like him, they told him he didn't belong there because he didn't deserve it.
You know he didn't deserve his ticket and a lot of times I felt like he grew up like this and you know, and then he went through this journey and then he inherited this giant factory, you know, and he never anticipated it and I feel like that's almost what happened to me with jon stewart, I got this random golden ticket and then the next thing you know I'm running a chocolate factory, you know, but those but those stories really connected with me. All the books that were fantastic connected with me. Do you reflect? I mean, people love rags to riches stories, obviously, but yours is really so extreme.
On the scale, even just geographically, going from apartheid in South Africa to the pinnacle of global satire in the United States in a show that has been present in countries all over the planet. Yeah, I mean, that's not just about growing up in a working class area. or end up in the cabinet, that's almost it, which is also just as difficult, as I understand it, in England, at the moment, there are periods when you don't necessarily pinch yourself, but you're in New York or Los Angeles or wherever think you are. I can't believe you are the same person who lived the life you lived definitely one thing, honestly I would recommend this to anyone.
It is an exhausting experience, you will hate some moments, but write your story, write it yourself. it's for your friends write it for your family that's really why I wrote the book I wrote it for the people in my life and I wrote it the way I would have wanted them to hear me tell the stories and that's the way I thought that I would find the most authentic way to share all of this because if I told strangers I would be too afraid if I shared my pain with people I didn't know. I don't think he would have been as forthcoming, but I told him. stories for people that I loved and that's what I put in the book and one thing I will tell you that I got out of it was an appreciation for every person and every moment that has brought me to where I am today, it also made me realize. more than I ever thought I did, how much I deserve to be where I am today and that's something that I've allowed people to steal from me sometimes, I think we all do it in our lives, you know, we feel guilty. to achieve it sometimes we feel guilty for being in a place we are sometimes you know it's almost the remorse of a survivor it's the world telling you why you why you instead of going why not I you already know and once I wrote the book and I sat down with it and reviewed the stories because it takes place over a very long period of time and you know people say this is an action-packed life, but for me, I don't think it's action-packed.
Wow, there's 18 stories from 20 years, so it's like it's one story a year, I'm like, oh, that was a boring year, you know, but I understand that it is, you know, it's a pretty intense story in which a lot of people. I've been lucky enough not to live, but I really recognize that I go, I go, my family and I went through a lot of things, I went through a lot of things and the fact that I am where I am today is, in the words of my mother, a miracle. and visit you in the United States never ever my mom would never ever like it maybe I could bribe her if I had a grandson that would be the only way to fool my mom my mom hates traveling I understand that my grandmother explained it to me better and that you know that by writing the book I got to revisit my life, which was really fantastic.
I had to leave and I learned things which is why I say write the book you will learn things about your family that you don't ask because family we take things for granted we all think we know our parents we will think we know our grandparents but in reality we know anecdotal pieces, you knowyou could die and she says, I'm not afraid to die, honey, she's like that because then I go, I go and I meet my maker and I say. Oh, I'm fine, you know, we argue and we fight about it, but I understand where it's coming from and I admire that in my mother, you know, uh, because unfortunately you know I had to face the fact that I was in a country that has a horrible record in the protection of women from domestic abuse, you know, many of us see that in many different situations it is not prioritized, it is always seen as if we know and it is always the same story, you know, I was watching the documentary and I couldn't believing parallels always starts with a slap always starts with a story always starts with a minor incident and people always let that slide, let it go, let it go, let it happen and then you leave, she was murdered and if you read the statistics In any country you will be surprised at the number of murders that occur and you will be able to trace them back to domestic violence, it's not a surprise it's a warning sign, that's why I wrote about this.
So in the book it is because I wanted to share that experience with people because I know that many people are going through that and the sad thing is that we are afraid and we are ashamed to share it, shame is one of them. of the most powerful tool that surprisingly you know oppresses you, you know, domestic abusers use shame, child abusers use shame to prevent the victim from claiming their justice and my mom always told me, honey, I won't be ashamed because some man could. Don't control yourself, you won't shame me because you are the person who has done something wrong, she said the shame should go back to where it belongs to the person who committed the crime, to the person who put his hands on me.
Don't worry about me, I have nothing to be ashamed of, since we said that your mom is the heroine of the book. There are a lot of smaller parts in the book and I'm wondering if any of them have reached out and I'm thinking specifically about Zahira, who is that and there will be people in this audience who can really relate to this story of a young man. You describe yourself as an uncomfortable-looking young man at the time. He didn't look uncomfortable. I suffered with um extreme acne um acne vulgaris he had nodules on his face.
I almost get offended sometimes when people say oh you don't look like it, like some people say it like I don't know if I think I really get like that. That's one of the few things that gets me because I remember what it was like, you know, when people say oh, you don't do it, if you don't look like I don't believe it, then they show me the pictures. I mean, I didn't take pictures because of this, if you saw yourself as a horrible human being, why would you be snapchatting? You know, people don't understand that and it wasn't like basic acne.
I tried to explain it to people. You know I had to go see a doctor. I had these nodules on my face and pus was coming out of them and it looked like I was having an allergic reaction all the time. You know, I was embarrassed at school. I mean, I remember. At one point, at the height of my shame, I was like shopping for makeup, you know, I apply makeup and I put it on like to this day, when women like they tell me, I'm like, I know, trust me, I know, I know what you say. makeup to hide your skin and makeup makes your skin worse and now you are worse and now you are putting on more mech and it is this vicious circle and then at night you don't want to wash it off or you are tired, but you know that if you don't do it in the morning you will you'll wake up and then your pillows will get the thing and you just know it and you're trying to clean it up like I knew I hated that and I hated myself you know that yeah that's how I had that and growing up like that is imagining you're in this world of race and all these things, but one thing that's universal is this discomfort when you were a teenager, you know, growing up. pains here I was and at that moment I didn't care about racism or apartheid or anything like that, I thought that those are not my problems this here this here is the main problem and uh yes, and zahira was a person who somehow way I guess she saw through that, but it's a classic teen angst story because you effectively get in the friend zone with this gorgeous girl, never work up the courage to ever ask her out, and then you find out she moved to America and then the hammer blow of the story is the next day when her friend tells you oh she was just waiting for you to ask her out yeah oh that's it yeah the um man, I've had nightmares about that man if there was ever anything in my life that made me taught What he told me about regret was that I'm glad it happened to me when it did because it happens to me at such a young age that I think it has been the propellant that has fueled my drive in all aspects of my life and under the regrets .
I hate the idea of ​​not knowing as many times as people we don't know because we're afraid, we're afraid of rejection fundamentally, that's the number one thing we fear, it's the reason we don't talk in an office, it's the reason why. That we don't say we have a good idea is the reason we don't try to do what we want to do because we are afraid of being rejected by the tribe we want to belong to, not realizing that if we realize our true self, we will find the tribe we belong to and at that moment imagine this was a girl who in my opinion was the most beautiful girl in school, she looked like a young Salma Hayek and all the boys were like her. so beautiful and she was talking to me and talking to me as a person and she gave me her phone number, her landline, like if you're a young person in this audience, you don't understand, you don't understand what I am.
Talking about there being a landline that had more going on than a cell number because a landline meant there were parents involved in the equation meant that when I called her someone would answer the phone and I would have to go through them to get to her and still so she confided that in me and she likes me as a person and I never thought that she had no chance, she is the girl that everyone likes and then I found out that no, she likes you too if you had said something she could have you and you see that Not knowing is something I don't believe in in life because you can never go back you can never know you can never fail if you're going to fail failure is an answer so you know you know what you say I love you to a person who says I don't love you yeah, It's painful but now you know it, you know it and that for me is something that I use in life, it's like just not living with regrets that we've had.
We have about 20 minutes left and we have some questions from the audience of varying degrees of quality um james Drain where is James? Oh, are you going to call everyone? I feel like you're putting them on the spot when you do it right, yeah, well. maybe you should read the question first and if it's popular then name and shame the person and this is a good question: which experience is scarier? Visiting an American emergency room on your first night on the daily show or sharing a Ferrari with Jerry Seinfeld. Oh oh. One is: let's easily think of the first night on the daily show sharing a Ferrari with Jerry Seinfeld.
I've never felt more comfortable because when you know, I've lived a very blessed life and when I was sitting in a Ferrari. with jerry seinfeld i had the luxury and you know the privilege of having sat in a ferrari before um uh and jerry is a comedian I'm a comedian we see him as a companion and a mentor going to the emergency room in America was a terrifying experience, but I mean, you know, the doctors were great and it was a panic, but it was whatever. The first night of the daily show was one of the few times in my life that I can remember everything.
It's like it's more than nerves it's panic it's a moment when you that's where the doubt comes in everything came rushing into my head you're a fraud you're not funny you're stupid what are you doing here you're stupid this is America why are you even In this country what are you what are you doing? go home it's not too late if you leave now they can't say anything about you just disappear just go away like so many things are playing in my mind so many doubts because I thought they were going to reject me, they were going to reject me, I'm so scared and I thought , and then what happens if my country rejects me?
Because now I am the South African who is doing what I do. I am the African who is doing this and then if I fail now, will I embarrass my country? Will I shame my continents? How does this work? And then I'll shame biracial people. things and then in my head I think, oh gosh, what if I was Pierce Morgan from the daily show? What happened now is that I'm thinking about all these things and it was so brutal because that's what happens to us. it's when you have a chance it's when that phrase you know when that when that when that poem made sense to me our greatest fear our greatest fear is not that we are inadequate our greatest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure that is I really understand it because it's so much easier to wither and walk away, no, I didn't want to do it anyway, I didn't know, just walk away because then you'll never have to take that responsibility, that was it.
Honestly, it was one of the scariest moments of my life, and like a lot of scary moments in your life, once you've done it, you're like, oh, this isn't bad, so you'll get better at doing it. You enjoy it and you still get nervous, but little by little you grow into that space and you know, I'm glad, I'm glad I jumped off the edge because it's been a fantastic journey, one of the most surprising things. From a comedian's point of view on the daily show is that obviously the clue is in the title, but most current affairs shows are weekly and you have to do it every day in terms of the industry changing that material, do you?
How much pressure do you feel when you wake up? I got up in the morning, I know you have to give a new show that night, well, you know, the funny thing is when I, when they gave me the show, you know, once John left, I remember thinking it was like this, this is crazy because you there isn't news every day there isn't and to be honest with you I don't think there should be news every day I feel like not this year I feel like oh no but I mean but I mean in general no I don't feel like should be news every day and I think what happened is that once news became a business, news organizations found a way to create news so that it could fill every day, you know, we used to live in a world where I always tell the people I go to why do you need breaking news?
Do you really need breaking news? Do you need to know at 8 a.m. that fidel castro died? Why did he pressure you specifically? Many times not. We have been taught that we need to know right away. what this person died what just happened what there are some things we need to know in an instant but it feeds that cycle and I didn't, I didn't believe in it, it was like, you know, it was like This is crazy and then a man named came along Donald J. Trump and possessed within himself the ability to fabricate so much news.
You know, I used to watch comedy songs and I still do comedy shows and cartoons and sometimes I get frustrated. You know you would see characters who seemed to get into so many things where you would be like this: this is not realistic, you can't stumble so many times, you can't make mistakes, many times you can't and yet Donald J. Trump without Failure manages to create a new scandal every time, we have never seen anything like this, as if at some point your smallness is surprised, you can't be surprised anymore, I feel like people don't need to pay for botox anymore because faces are permanent. they're stuck so he just does it and now we're in a space where sometimes I feel like we can't even keep up because now I'm in a space where I'm going can we wait can we wait why?
Are we done talking about that? Why did we end up talking about the fact that this man is? Do you know what his business interest is? What do you mean something happened in the theater? What do you mean something happened in Hamilton? That's news. What do you mean? Something happened, what did he say? Who did he just name? Isn't that person known as a racist? Wait, what's happening? We haven't talked about that story yet, and I feel like Donald Trump has learned that the secret to outwitting the news is to just keep creating. more is supply and demand, so what he does is he overcreates, you know, it's uh, I remember seeing a classic scene from, you know, American comedy.
I love Lucy and there's a fantastic conveyor belt scene that appears even in a lot of comedies where the conveyor belt just starts going faster than you can and that's what Donald Trump has almost done. It's like now you just don't have any. You're like, oh, whatever we let go on like this, that scandal can end. Whatever is good. um and so it's a lot of pressure but it's also a lot of fun and the most important thing is that I think I've realized that I have a gift and that gift has been that, you know, I was bequeathed a beautiful platform, an incredible platform, John Stewart created an incredible legacy and one thing that he gave me: A lot of people didn't realize that he gave me the freedom to use that legacy to shape what I think a new show should be and that was one of the most beautiful things and Ianswer, good.
I don't know the question: will I get married? I don't know, that's the honest truth, so you know, you never know what happens in this world, so the answer is no, I'm not single and I don't know. Well, apologies for asking that question oh no it's not, I thought I got the name right, which brings us to the end, uh Trevor, I'm not in charge, don't take it out on me, but you've been a wonderful audience. Those have really been amazing. We could do this all night. This is fun. You guys really can't, we can't, actually, but we couldn't, no, it's funny because he's looking at his watch and they're like, "we." I have time and you know people have the place and they close and people work here and I would love to hang out and this is another case where if we were in Africa right now we could do it as long as we want because because The truth is I've learned that time is like race is a construct, uh, and Africans were the most prominent.
You know, they understood that before everyone and, uh, it's funny, because you know we'll say, oh, let's hang out here and we could do it. that now I could override the system and say guys, let's just hang out, which would be great, but what I've learned and this happens to me specifically in places like the British, I'll take more time on stage than before. assigned and then when I go backstage, no one will say I did that, but what everyone will do is they'll have something like it's painful but it's very mild like it's like England is just a ball of passive aggressiveness, that's it. which is, it would be someone who would walk backstage and they won't say you hung out and say, oh, that went better than expected, right?
Yeah, oh, they were really wonderful. weren't they oh yeah, they seemed like they never wanted you to leave oh yeah, you, oh, you had fun with them, you really know that, and then I'll say yes, but we have to do it too, yeah, sorry. We have to go unfortunately we can't, I'm sorry, I can tell you that probably what I like most about the United Kingdom is how I get on, people here almost suffer like an excess of empathy. I've never seen it anywhere else. the world where a british person feels the pain of what they think you feel in a case like me would you know walk up to a restaurant when they've closed i'll go like hello can we say oh sorry we're closed oh no we just got here I'm so sorry you can try that oh no, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, it's so honestly it's so funny because I wonder why you're in so much pain. what's going on and I always like to imagine myself as, oh, this is a British thing it's always been.
Now I think about it as I like to rethink what colonization was really like because now I imagine the British launching a campaign in South America, oh. we're taking it I'm so sorry we're taking it I'm so sorry yes, it's mine oh, I'm so old, I'm so sorry, really, oh yes, it's all mine, oh, I know it's horrible. So, uh, yeah, I mean, I could do this all night with you, but we have time limits, but I just want to tell you honestly, for my part, I couldn't appreciate you more. You know, I recognize each person. who supports me, I try and push myself every day to do the best I can and, uh, every South African, you know, British person, I mean, what's funny to me is that this was the world that propelled me to the daily program and I never forget that people ask me everything.
The moment they leave, why do they continue traveling around the world where I go? because the world took me there and I want you to know that I really appreciate each of you for coming, supporting me, buying the book, being here with us. tonight and thanks to you Matt, you were amazing, I really appreciate it man, thank you, pleasure, thank you all, thank you so much.

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