MAGA's Worst Nightmare Exposes Trump's Lies; His Plan Implodes

0:00A colossal monster tearing through the streets, a city in ruins, nowhere to hide, until he finds a way out behind the wheel of the all-electric Toyota Toyota CHR. instant torque getaway handling and immeasurable well factor john cho stars in escape experience the thrill test drive toyota's new all-electric family at your local dealer toyota let's go places all right to the fox news producers to the news max producers to breitbart to libs of tiktok i would like to issue a trigger warning regarding my next guest. He is bisexual and he was raised by five, one, two, three, four, five gay. He was raised in the crime ridden hellscape socialist mom, Donna Stan, Brooklyn woke Sharia out the wazoo.

1:00He is also the host of recess therapy, celebrity substitute the new youtube hit sensation outside tonight and the author of a new book called how to grow up without becoming a grown-up that comes out this august 4th please welcome to i've had it weekend julian shapiro barnum that was the best intro i've ever gotten well you know these fox producers watch me yeah all the time and so i had to issue a trigger warning because you or what they warn everybody about so when i was so yes this is true i have five gay parents i was raised by three moms and two dads and like when i was you know around high school we started to joke that like i was a conservative's worst nightmare raised by and even now like raised by big gay family and i and i work with kids right i know if you could have only shown up with like blue hair i know i should lean in maybe a bunch of like pins yes they're really they're really I should talk about my pronouns more.

2:00What are your pronouns? You know, I'm going to disappoint he, him. Mine or she, her. Look at us, sis. Let me ask you a question. Please do. We were talking about this on our other podcast the other day. An AI actress or actor. Sure. I do not think an AI character should get human pronouns. I think an AI character. Yes, as an it, it. Well, I don't even, look, let's just. I don't think we should humanize the robots. I don't want to even get that far with it. I don't want... Look, I have a BFA in acting, and it wasn't fun to get. I don't think we should even entertain the AI actor thing. I agree.

2:40I think it's boring. Yeah. I think it's hard to look at, and I agree. Let's not give them pronouns. Unless they ask for it. No. No. I don't think we should be subservient to these robots, but I want to dive into the five gay parents. Let's do it. Okay. Let's do roll call. Start. Do you want the story? I want the whole story. It's fascinating. So here's how it happened. Okay. So my mom's Nicole and Lauren, they met in law school and they were a couple, a lesbian couple, no less. And they wanted to have a baby. Okay. And so they asked their friends, my dad's a gay couple, Michael and Lauren, if they would be the sperm donor to each of them.

3:21And so they had me and my brother and sister, ellison shea and then when i was two my mom's broke up and they met other women and they raised uh so so when i was a kid there were six parents but there was an amicable uncoupling and there's really five but so from like you know two years old to 11 years old i was raised in park slope by six gay parents me and my brother and sister okay um brother and sister gay also really so That's genetics. Those genetics are strong, right? You can't get rid of it. Yeah. But yeah. Okay. So lots of questions. So what were the mom's names? Nicole, Sophia, and Lauren.

4:01Dad, Lauren also. Sophia, Lauren. Exactly. Okay. Nicole, Sophia, and Lauren. So when they approach the gay male couple, how do you decide who gets whose sperm? I mean, that's like fascinating to me. You know, I always like to imagine what that conversation was like. I've asked them about it and I, you know, I don't 100 % know what happened, but I like to imagine that they like took them out to a nice dinner and they were like, hey, you know, so like also we'd like love to have your sperm and also the unagi role. But I think it was actually a multi-year conversation. And my one dad, Michael, was the sperm donor to both of them, both my moms.

4:45So my brother and sister and I have the same dad and we were all raised as siblings together. Okay. When you say you were all raised together, I picture like this hippie, gay commune where they're basket weaving and doing things like that. What does that mean? It means, so we had three households. Each couple had their own house, you know, as couples often do. Were they close to each other? Yeah. Cobble Hill and then two in Park Slope. Okay. Until I was 11, I would actually go between three houses every week, which I think probably was a lot. I think it felt normal at the time, but then I moved to Philadelphia when I was 11, and I think it was a little bit, it was nice to take a step back and kind of settle down.

5:24Right. My siblings and I would do family week activities as the whole family. My parents just did like, put so much effort into feeling like a cohesive family unit. And I think, you know at this point in my life I've met maybe one to three other people other people my age who have had similar family structures like there really aren't that many um kids out there who have this but the the kind of unifying thread there is like I think my moms felt like the odds were stacked against them like they were trying this family experiment yeah I think it felt so important to succeed. And empowering, I bet.

6:03Exactly. From like a personal level, from like the world was against them level. And I think they just needed to show that a family like this could work. And it did. Okay. And then when the moms were pregnant, were they pregnant at the same time? No, my siblings are two years younger than me. Okay. So were they pregnant at the same time then? Oh, they're twins. So it was me. And then two years later, my other mom got pregnant. Gotcha. Okay. So what is the dad's name? Is this sperm donor? Michael. Michael can really shoot it, huh? Yeah. He was, he was moving, he was moving and grooving. Yeah. Way to go.

6:37Shout out to Michael. Shout out to dad. Shout out to those strong swimmers. Okay. So you have. That's the most I've ever talked about my family. But last. I love it. It's amazing. Last thing I'll say about it is like, you know, I, my family has been something that like has defined my life. It's something that like, I've always just been unbelievably proud of and like excited about because I think I know it's unique, but like people are always like, what was it like? What was it like? It's just is my normal, right? Like I don't have any frame of reference for what it's like to have straight parents or two parents.

7:13Um, and I think that's like, maybe my big takeaway from it is like, I think people from the outside in are always kind of like, man, that's so interesting. But it like, wasn't some fantastical crazy thing. Like it was, you know, like I do have five parents. It's just a lot of phone calls. Right? It's just a lot. It's that many more people to love you. And I've often thought that gay people, it's really intentional family planning. 100%. Gay people really want to have these children. This isn't a drunken one night stand and you're like, oh, shit, I broke. I'm a train wreck. I just did a bunch of blow.

7:56Right. This is a very intentional parenting. And when you hear MAGA speak about traditional families, because I always say that is just coded bigotry. 100 % to try to make families like yours feel less than and to diminish you to diminish your mothers to diminish your fathers and say that you are not acceptable and how do you feel when you hear this talk and this rise of all of these quote-unquote traditional family values especially juxtaposing that when you look at Trump who has um three baby mamas five kids banging porn stars Elon Musk, God only knows how many, I mean, that deadbeat. So how do you feel and how do your moms and dads feel when they hear that?

8:44So like a huge part of, actually talk about it in my book. There's a whole chapter about this, but like a huge part of my childhood was going to like marriage equality protests and like was marching. And like my moms took me and my siblings to Washington. We went to City Hall. Like we protested as children for my parents to have the right to get married and for the right for our parents to be recognized. Like even, this is something that we're still dealing with, but like you can only have two legal parents. I can only have two legal guardians. So like my dad had to give up his legal guardianship of me so that my other mom could adopt me.

9:23But like that's not the case. That's not the reality of my family. um so like i my entire life has been steeped in this like fight for the mainstream to recognize my family as a family yeah and like so on one hand like this is nothing new like it's just been there the whole time there's this like picture that at times can make me cry to look at of my mom uh it was like in the in the new york times or something uh it's i'm like five and my mom has me on her shoulder and she's like yelling and my t-shirt says bad law on it. And it was just like from such a young age, we were just like fighting for very basic rights for her.

10:06And I just, it makes me emotional because I'm sure it was so comforting to have a kid like love her that much. I don't know. Like I'm sure that was really comforting. But anyway, like it's just been the norm and I'm sure it's going to be the norm for the rest of my life, but like, it just does, I like can't even comprehend it. That's kind of my, it's like, that's, I'm sure that's how so much of this feels where it's like, we look at the right calling for basic human rights to be stripped. And like, I just can't, it just feels like a lack of understanding of humanity. Like, I don't have anything nuanced to say.

10:41It just doesn't make sense to me. Right. It just feels, they don't, it's complete bigotry. It's complete bigotry. And I think that the conservative male is a very scared person. These people are scared of books, libraries, drag queens, comedians, late night talk show posts. So they've gone after, as you know, Stephen Colbert has been sacrificed for the ego and for the fears of these submissive men. I call all of the sycophants that circle the president the submissive wives because they could put on a master class for the trad wives with how they don't stand up for anything. And with late night being such a political thing right now, Jimmy Kimmel, Stephen Colbert, and Trump gets his feelings hurt very, very easily by late night comedians that joke about presidents.

11:34And that's a part of the American experience. All late night hosts do this. They dabble into politics. They make you giggle. Both sides, you know, or the joke could be on both. So in this climate, you have started a new late night show called Outside Tonight. And for my listeners, it's on YouTube. And he films all over New York in a different location. And I think this is a really brave moment to embark on late night because it's not just late night right now. this really is a much bigger thing because this regime is attacking comedy particularly late night television so tell me why you wanted to do this and then also is that voice of the regime always kind of monitoring everything that we're all doing i'm sure hi fox um hi five gay parents sorry but tell me about it tell tell my viewers about outside yeah oh my god i have so much to say and Yes, let me synthesize my thoughts.

12:42Okay. So basically, Outside Tonight is a project that I started in 2020, kind of that summer during BLM. My background is in comedy. I come from theater. And that summer, I was looking for a way to just connect with people. I felt like it was COVID. Everyone was protesting. I felt so isolated and scared and alone. And so I put a desk and some chairs on the street one night and put on a show called How Are You Doing Right Now? Not the smartest name, but anyone could sit and I would just go, how are you doing right now? And like, that was the show. But it like, everyone was opening up to me and we were talking about politics.

13:27We were talking about like humanity. Yeah. And I got a bunch of my friends involved and we filmed four of those episodes. And I was like, this is the best thing I've ever done. I wasn't good at it, but it made me so happy. I went back to college. I did my senior year of college. I almost didn't because I liked doing the show so much. Then I started interviewing kids and that turned into my career. But the whole time I was like, I need to do this outdoor late night show. Not because I was like, I need to save late night or because of any delusions of grandeur, just because at its core, sitting outside and talking to people spoke to me in such a deep way.

14:04It resonated. then like two years ago i was like oh i think i can do this now i think my career is in a place where i have the resources to like enlist the people i need to help me make this and now we're doing it the whole idea behind it is like i wanted to do away with the studio model which clearly is all about control and has become like a way to censor uh i wanted to do away with the studio itself, which to me is about democratizing a medium that has always been very inaccessible to the public. You know, late night as a genre was all about bringing the entertainment industry into your living room.

14:49That's why it was created. But we don't need that anymore. The entertainment industry is everywhere. You can get it all the time. So I wanted to create a show that anyone just walking down the street, if you hear music, Like if you hear people talking, you can walk up and get the show. And not just that, it's celebrities, but also just like everyday people being on the show. It was this, I was like, how can we create like a democratized version of late night? I think that's what's more interesting right now. Yeah. Instead of this like top down, this is what's happening in culture. It's like, let's create culture.

15:24Let's show my favorite pieces of culture, my favorite people in comedy and music. So it was a reframing. Instead of this is what's happening in the entertainment industry, it was like this is happening in my corner of the entertainment industry. The one that I watched, you did a gay dog competition. and listener the p the owners brought their dogs out and they made the case like as to if their dogs were gay and they voted on the dog's gayness i mean that kind of stuff is just so fun i loved it but but like to that point like i think there are people who are talking about the state of politics or like i say state of industry that's not what i meant to say but there are people commenting on politics in late night so well.

16:12That is a genre, that is a side of late night. And there are people who are doing it better than I could. Another part of late night is the variety comedy show. My issue is that it's either super political or completely apolitical. I feel like the comedic side of late night used to have a clear political voice to it, but has lost that. I think because it's either you're like completely far left or far right or you're appeasing to everybody. You're completely down the middle. I was like, how can we create an alt comedy lefty late night show? Like Outside Tonight is super queer. It has like a very clear belief to it.

16:56We're not like spoofing the news, talking to the news, but like the bodies we put on the show, the space we're taking up with the show. like you know what we believe and i think that is powerful in its own right don't you think julian that sometimes a way to be political is to normalize the culture around queerness 100 and to platform queer voices and say you know look we're happy we are normal functioning people regardless of what you hear on fox news regardless of what you hear on your instagram or tiktok feed There's a whole world out here that exists. And you can either tune in if we terrify you, then you don't have to watch it.

17:39Because as I mentioned, and this has been scientifically proven, conservatives are very fear based people. So somebody like you scares them very much. But I think that that is a more important part of what we have to do in this era is normalize the culture of acceptance and not just acceptance, but radical acceptance. really radically accepting people where they are, unless you're a Trumper, no acceptance. I think, yeah, I think it's just important to show like joy and fun and that in itself is a radical act, especially at a time like now. I know. Genuinely. I know. Can I shout, can I do a major shout out?

18:21Yeah, yeah, yeah. Your son, Roman, worked in the art department on Outside Tonight and went above and beyond. And he brought his A game. He showed up and worked so hard. We were filming on the street, in the sun. We filmed nine episodes in a month. And he was like MVP. Everyone loved working with him. He was so wonderful. He talked a lot about how he had never worked on a set before. And you would never have been able to tell. He like really just was such a highlight. And we loved working with him. And everyone said he looks like me, which was very funny. everyone would call him little julian that's what he said very funny he said that sometimes when they were setting up the you know camera angles i'd say roman he's sitting in for me because y 'all are the same but he just was like such a joy to work with and he's so professional and i think just will add to any place he is and you should hire him if you're watching you know thank you for saying that he had the best summer he loved working with you it was hard work Yes, it's hard work.

19:29And I think that, you know, workplaces, whatever the person at the top, whatever they set as the mood, that trickles down. And so he had the best experience. He had so much fun. Thank you for having me. Of course. Okay. I want my audience to get to know you more. The people who know you know you, but as we all know, there are all these little corners of the internet and I have my little corner here. And you have a show that went completely viral called Recess Therapy and it's massive, massive on social media. And I want to play my audience a clip of you interviewing, interviewing Rihanna. Let's play the clip.

20:07Miles, what's like the best way to make a new friend? I actually just wander around until somebody wants to play with me. Really? Oh, because you know you're the prize. I don't really know how to do it, but I wander around. That's just what I do. Have you ever lied before, Miles? Like a few times. Rihanna, have you ever lied? Never. Not once, right? Only maybe white lies. Don't lie anymore. It's all. so the that is a huge huge hit and i just want to ask you do you like kids i love working with kids so much i i genuinely do i i all kids all kids it's only parents that i ever have issues i'm more a case-to-case basis really kids yeah no i do when you have an asshole kid i don't work with them again no i really you know it's it's funny like with with recess therapy it's like five to ten minute interviews.

21:07With my other show, Celebrity Substitute, which is where I go into a – we work with the Department of Education. We go into a different school every episode. And we have a celebrity come teach for the day. I don't meet those kids until the morning. And that's a real toss-up. Because it's like I show up at 8 a.m. and I meet 12 kids. And I'm going to then be with them for like five hours. And that's always like a personality toss-up. But it's like – I have to love them for them to love me. Of course. And so it is this like labor of love. And I feel like whenever I meet them, it's less about like me liking them and more about me like desperately trying to get them to like me.

21:48So Zoran deployed your skills. Yes. This is one of my favorites. So earlier this year, you were at a press conference where the mayor unveiled his child care plan alongside toddlers. And you were there as a member of the press. And you asked very important questions. to these little New Yorkers. Let's play this clip. My favorite animal is a shark. Is a shark? That's honestly such a good one. And a animal is a goat. Oh, and a goat. Thank you all for your answers. My favorite one is a gold snake that can move and it has gold eyes. And it has a long tail, a super, super duper tail. and it can snap the cars and crash the cars and those two cars can get fired.

22:36So just to make sure I'm getting all that, it's a golden snake with gold eyes and super long crash cars. And they get fired. Thank you for your answer. That was insane. That is so cool. I'm, you know, obsessed with our mayor. Oh my God. He's like the best. I was just listening to his interview with The Daily and he's just like so well spoken. Anyway, I've worked with him a bunch of times. I've had AOC on my show. I love talking with kids and politicians about the state of the world. I think they offer such simplified solutions to really complicated issues. I think they're able to see through bullshit really easily.

23:21To them, these really partisan issues that have been over-thought and like uh over complicated um kids just see right in the humanity of it and they don't they don't see all the bullshit like they're just able to be like no people should have this because they deserve this um so i've had a lot of i've having like zoran and aoc on uh and brad lander like it's brought me so much joy um having those conversations with kids but that was such a crazy moment because it was a real press conference and they brought these kids out and I'd never been to a press conference before and I was like oh my god am I ruining this whole thing but it was so cute no it was so cute and I think it's he's done such a good job um governing I think when he brings out these kids and he shows you this is something we want governor yes the government to provide universal pre-k and this is what these kids look like that live in the city you know it's really difficult for most people now granted there's cultists in this country that would go those kids our parents are lazy right but the majority the overwhelming majority of us see that and think yes their parents work hard they work they should be harder to pay for child care but for high quality right child care like i think what he does such a good job of time and time again is just like kind of what i was saying the kids do is like not making these basic things issues like making things obvious and like of course buses should be fast and free of course people shouldn't pay more for rent like of course there should be free child care like they're just so matter of fact but i think having the kids there was such like a brilliant way of illustrating that he also makes it fun he's yes yeah he makes it fun he's an a plus what do your moms think of zoran they love him they they they don't they live in new jersey but they're very charmed by him.

25:22Yeah. My mom, when we had AOC on the show, my mom never comes to the shoots. Okay. But she was like, I have, you have to let me come. She was like, I just have to meet her. And my mom came to the shoot and she stood like far away and just watched. And at the end, she went up and she shook her hand and it was like a really big deal. She's so proud. She's so proud. It's incredible. You know, I always say that I know a lot of women, I'm from Oklahoma city originally. And I know a lot of women who have the luxury of saying, I'm just not political. Sure. And these are white women that are married and their husbands do well.

26:01And so their bank account and their complexion excludes them from having to give a shit about politics. And so when I think about your moms and their fight for social justice and raising you and your siblings, the twins, um how personal that is and how every person should have the right to marry whom they want breed if they so choose to procreate and um this regime is really trying to backtrack on all of that stuff so combining like all of this joy you're a very joyful person you come in here you sit down you live in zorans new york which a lot of times you don't feel the MAGA stuff in New York.

26:43It's a safe haven. Right. But it's, but it's there. And as, as we are all trying to navigate, and my listeners kind of go through this too, is we're all trying to navigate our place as Americans. And as you sit down and you make this really joyful outside tonight, or you, or you interview those adorable kids and, and then there's this incubation going on over here where everything that your mother's fought for and the Harvey Milks and all of the progress and particularly if you look even to black Americans, the dismantling of the voting rights act that has taken place, all of the joy that people on the right feel about taking those rights away from families like yours.

27:29How do you reconcile that and how do you still maintain joy at the same time? Wow. You know, I mean, honestly, I think that there, like, it's two things. Here's my, here's my honest answer. I think all you can do sometimes is put it out of mind sometimes, which is a privileged thing to do but I think sometimes you have to just have joy I agree I think that's an important thing to do but then also like you have to have your coalition and community of like like-minded brave uh and powerful people who are working together to fight against that. Like everybody in my community, like my sister is a community organizer and runs a mutual aid group called We The People.

28:37Like the people I surround myself with, like we are all working towards this vision of the future that isn't that. And I feel like the fact that we are all working together gives me hope as well. So it's a balancing act. Do you think outside tonight and it being queer, do you think that that is a joyful form of resistance? 100 % you think? I think, well, that's the thing. It's like, kind of the end of the last thought is it's like fight, but also enjoy yourself and create and create. And then also like proliferating joy and queer joy and that is resistance that that is a powerful act and like not taking that for granted and like not letting all of that hate silence your voice at all or ever and the second that that does that that that's losing to some extent yeah when i watched um some of your shows outside tonight which comes out every wednesday every Wednesday, every Wednesday on outside tonight on YouTube.

29:48Um, I thought, you know, these are great ways of resistance. These are great ways to actively feel joy and resist in the middle of what we're all experiencing right now. And, um, you have a book coming out. This is my book, how to grow up without becoming a grown up. Okay. This book really is as we're having this conversation, like everything that we were just talking about. Yeah. It's all about like how to use the philosophies and the mindset of children and bring it into your adult life. I believe that like the way kids sure like the whole idea is that like yes I did recess there I've been doing recess there for five years.

30:27I've interviewed upwards of 6 ,000 children in the past five years and the things they say are brilliant and hilarious and sweet and cute and if you want to hear those things you can watch the show but at a certain point I started to feel like the more impactful thing was the way they were moving through the world and the way they were navigating their friendships and their anger and really the way they were living was more interesting to me so I started taking notes and collecting essays and basically I like put together my hope for a compelling case of why I think adults would be happier if they acted more like kids.

31:07I have a whole chapter in here basically about how I think the way kids stand up to injustice is something to emulate. My whole thought process behind it is that like we raise kids to believe that their voices matter and can make change. We raise kids to believe that like these very small things like recycling and like going to a protest can change the world. And I think to be an adult is to believe that your voice does nothing. I think a lot of people start to feel like, oh my God, these issues are so big that there's like nothing I can do to change anything. And I think that is losing. And I think we need to be as confident as kids because I think then we train ourselves to do little things and little things grow into big things.