Dark Humour for Dark Times: Ben Bankas

30:17We're giving an alternative for Ben Bankis. No you're not. You're cancelling my show and then you're saying this is what yours allowed and then nobody's going to buy tickets nobody's going to go to that show but that's fine. They almost rather have nobody show up to the show but it's not offensive than offensive and it's sold out. Because the way they portray you is that you're this kind of edgy dark lord who lives in the recesses of the internet and the ever loads of people that i know and i would include normies under this umbrella love your stuff share your stuff you are the mainstream you are far more mainstream in that sense than somebody who's like i don't know what a woman is they want to discredit me especially in the Canadian media they want to make it like I think in this video the woman was saying he is this new rage bait comedy it's like oh yeah you mean like Lenny Bruce right rage bait comedy from 1962 I mean this new phenomenon where a guy goes on stage says something really funny about a recent topic that's sensitive and everybody laughs they are it's pure propaganda they have a billion dollars behind them and i'm an independent artist and i'm canadian getting canceled in my own country by the canadian arts council and all that those people in order to put in their terrible comics that nobody knows and in their and they're so stupid that they think that my fans who are regular people are gonna get a refund notice on their ticket for my show and go well i'm glad i'm glad because that was going to be really bad what else is there to see oh uh comedy two female queer comics doing a a day interpretive dance let's go to that instead i mean are they that stupid that they really think that they're going to convince my fans who are working people jocks ex-hockey players, cop, lawyers, professionals, business owners, they're going to go and watch an extremely far left performance of nobody, no name comics.

32:28And this is what the, you know, people, it's like, they just think like, they just bought tickets. They didn't know what they were buying tickets. No, they're my fans. There's right now 1.4 something million between Facebook and Instagram. And they want to see me. They don't want to see your crap. And they're going to, all those all the venues that have tried or or want to cancel in canada they're going to be begging for me to come back in a couple years when i'm you know and they're going to say we're sorry we did we got new management we got i'm going to say i'm not coming back there man i'm not supporting a business that does that i think you're overestimating

33:07Francis Foster:people's ability to change their mind man they're not going to change their mind they're just going to be they're going to be kicked out because and because they do you really think that ben because You said it yourself, since they believe in communism, they don't give a shit about the money. They don't, but I have faith that it will change. I mean, Pierre Poliev, maybe he'll win. If not, maybe I'll have to fucking run. I'm not going to do that. We just had Pierre on the show. I know, I know. I listened to it. I've met Pierre, and I really respect Pierre. But he needs to win because he needs to go a little bit harder.

33:44And I've said this to a few MPs in Canada. that i know and because look at trump he went really hard he went hard okay and he won so you either go hard and win or you pretend to be kind of in the middle and you lose the people you're going to the way you're going to win an election in canada and i mean in the states this is what happened is you're going to activate voters that never voted stop trying to win over you know the new the little india we're gonna go to little india and we're gonna put on a turban the white politician puts on a turban and goes please no no stop it just say what you actually want to do we're gonna deport all these people go go into the little india be like hey who's here legally raise your hand who's not okay get out But I'm saying that there has to be some aggressive policy.

34:43Like if I was to run for prime minister in Canada, I would say we're going to get rid of all wokeness in every establishment in the country that is government funded. Anybody who's government funded, if you want to be woke, you can be private and you can lose money. But the government's not going to lose money and subsidize something that, like these venues? Why does the government have to subsidize a venue if they're going to cancel arbitrarily different performances and lose money? Why? We should be, Canada should be encouraging all the best comedians in America to come to all of the venues and treat them with the utmost respect and the utmost, be super welcoming, especially if they're selling out, especially if the people that the government represents who are the taxpayers are buying tickets to the venue that's the whole their whole argument is it's a taxpayer venue yeah you know who's a taxpayer me you know who's a taxpayer all the all the people who are going to the show you know who isn't or barely is a taxpayer the people complaining well oh yeah they're a taxpayer but they got a tax return they're they're actually getting paid by the government they're not tax they're not a taxpayer they're getting three four or five six thousand dollars at the end of the year because they they made so little money a while back i pushed myself in training because i'm a bit of a legend but ended up with a back strain that took far longer to recover from than it ever used to nothing dramatic just one of those moments where you realize your body isn't snapping back the way it once did.

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37:43Francis Foster:Would you not think, and I honestly don't know about Canada, But when I think about the UK and there seem to be some similarities, I go, I think the reason that a lot of politicians in this kind of center right don't go the Trump route is that the public are very different. Like the population of the country is like - Or they're bought and paid for. But what I'm getting at is like, there's a big cultural difference between Canada and America and Britain. No? I mean, Ari Matias is a great job. I think he went to Canada. We had him on the show a while back and he just went. And it's great to be in Canada, as I call it, gay America.

38:19Francis Foster:Very creative. Never heard that one. But if an American made that joke in Britain, there is a kernel of truth to it in that people see the world differently. People are much more, they are on the balance of things more work, or at least there's more of them. Is that not fair? What did Pierre lose by? Like a percentage or something? Like one or two percent? it's so close it's so 50 50 right and and that's of the people that vote which is only like 60 or 70 of the whole country so that 30 they're mostly not woke because woke people vote that's why they keep winning because they're so organized and they're they got their organizations and they're in their unions and sending out emails oh that was another one in sudbury ontario one of one of my audience members told me that her union, her union, teachers union, sent her an email saying not to attend my show.

39:18So that's where they're at. But the teachers union, teachers union sent an email to the teachers in Sudbury, Ontario saying, do not attend the Ben Bankis comedy show. It's hate filled, blah, blah, blah. Do you know? At least I got right. But you know, what's interesting about teachers is that the good ones, they have the darkest sense of humor. Oh, yeah. My mom. Yeah. Because when I was working in schools, the stuff that you deal with on a day-to-day basis... Here's the thing. There aren't any good ones anymore. Well, the good one was the one that came to my show and ignored that. But there's no...

39:54Imagine an email going out to a company or an organization saying, please do not attend this drag time story hour. This is... That can't... Oh, that's... And even the show in Nanaimo that they canceled 900 seats, the next day they announced an all-ages drag event. literally the next day they announced it and that was their like we're so sorry that we even were about to maybe have him here so let's have as many gay people on stage with their penis as possible so um the people who love my comedy are definitely you know most in canada i've got you most of them if not 99 of them would become american like this or be okay with 51st state and the reason is because of like what you said they're trying so hard to convince the people on the right that you have no option your opinion is invalid you're not allowed to have it you'll be fired if you have it you're a comedian you like this guy he's been cancer we're not going to allow him to perform and so it pushes people to be like well maybe we should just get an you know be part of america where free speech is allowed because why is why are we being pushed and pulled by the left who is not the dominant force in canada in term financially just politically you have a bunch of poor loser people protesting things you know like how on a scale of one tenth how insane do you have to be to protest a comedy show like how like are you like do you just do that and then after you're like oh that was a tough day all right tomorrow uh we gotta talk to my accountant i got no they're they're nobodies right so the answer is a trump style thing would work well in britain and in canada it's just a matter of stop being afraid that you're gonna lose stop being afraid

41:45Francis Foster:to lose what i find interesting is how unaware these people are that like 40 years ago was exactly the way the other way around and it was the religious right that was protesting and canceling comedians i mean bill hicks final letterman appearance that wasn't broadcast because i think he came out as being pro-lesbian made a joke that sounded like he was you know daddy's two like billy's two mummies or whatever um and other george carlin george carlin wasn't being arrested because he wasn't woke enough like do you know what i mean so it's it's funny how the very movement and ideology that came up on this idea of like well artists should be free to be creative and shouldn't be restricted by the state and they're now doing the exact same thing it is incredible they're doing it in an even more aggressive way because you know back then it had never been done so it was kind of like where's this coming from why are they swearing so much why are they talking about vulgarity um and sex and and all these things like when lennie bruce would be arrested and george carlin and and richard bryer and um now it's like we had the 80s and 90s and the 2000s and now all of a sudden it's let's go back let's actually no no no all that stuff we've been doing for 30 years that people have been loving that's been making billions and billions of dollars for the entertainment industry and hollywood and made all these stars famous and made jimmy kimmel famous because he was doing blackface and you know made it jimmy fallon did black everybody's doing black but now only those people can be famous and those people that were bad before are now the most woke and nobody can come into the industry that's what it is because really to break out in the industry you have to be different you have to say what you really think and be yourself and yeah maybe in 20 30 years when you know maybe i'll be like you know what Some of what I said was a little too far.

43:39But that's because you already have money. You know what I'm saying? You've already made it.

43:44Francis Foster:And by the way, you don't want to lose it. There's another part of it, which is like, they all have to act like they're super woke, even if a lot of them aren't. Because if you push back against this, well, you did blackface. Here's a fucking photo on the front page of the New York Times. What are you going to do now? They're worth enough money to speak their mind. I think it's now, it's just that they truly are and have been brainwashed. And I think that even millionaires who are part of the Hollywood system are being brainwashed. And, you know, I mean, people are coming to their house, you know, and the FBI is coming to your house and going, maybe we'll do a little more like this.

44:21Maybe the shtick goes a little this way. I don't know if that's actually happening, but if you're a late night TV show, there is some affiliation with like public policy and there's a reason why they're doing it. so it's not purely money because they think if you know how much is jimmy gimme worth i don't

44:39Francis Foster:think it's about money it's about status it's about status and friendship groups and whatever like you have you have a cozy life you have your friends you have your you the the golf club that you all of that bullshit and people fear i think losing being ostracized by their community a lot more than they fear losing money actually or losing future earnings having friends is overrated if you have time to have friends you're doing something wrong i mean you know i mean you're you're a friend but like it's nice to have but you can't even say the word when you're a friend no no you know but like you know we're not sitting on the couch playing xbox for four hours you know i'm saying like we're adults this is you know do i go i have a family once you have a family and you're working all the time who's who's your friend right nobody right your agent you know you're gonna find out one day that is not true but well maybe not but i do think it's important i mean look i'd rather be friends with people i'm paying because then i can fire them i don't want to be friends true friendship right there i mean that show business friendship but yeah i think the thing is as well is that you know once you get to a certain point you define yourself by having the jimmy kimmel show are you really jimmy kimmel without the Jimmy Kimmel show.

45:57And also you see a lot of people who work in legacy media. There's this fear because on a part of, on a, on a level, they got given something. They got given an opportunity. Now to be fair to all of them, they made the most of that opportunity. The show became successful, whatever. But there's still a part of it that was given to you. You were given that opportunity. No one gave the opportunity to you, Ben. You built it off your own back, which means that you are far more stable and secure than even the Jimmy Kimmels of this world who knows that at a split second, it can be taken away from them.

46:29Well, when Jimmy Kimmel made the comments about, uh, Charlie Kirk and they took his show off the air and it was this whole like fake thing where it's like cancel culture is coming to the, you know, the Trump shut it down. And then he was back in the air two days later. So it was never like he was shut down. It was never like he stopped being paid. It was all fake now here's my question to jimmy kimmel you think that there's a a lack of freedom of speech for people on the left well how about change your show all of a sudden and go completely right and you know just go like gutfeld be on the right see what happens see what happens will your speech be taken away because that's the true test you know what i'm saying yeah number one it might they might question it until the viewership goes up got fell gets more views than than all of those other late night tv shows why because is it because he's he's not lying i don't even think some of the people like the jimmy jimmy this and jimmy that they don't even believe the stuff they're pushing like you said they're just they're doing a job and um they're doing it well in the sense that they'll cry on They'll cry.

47:48They'll cry on command if they got to prove their point. Or maybe they do believe it. I don't know. But the point is, if they switched up and tried to become right wing, they would have their speech taken away very quickly by those networks, in my opinion. But it's also it's not about being right wing. It's just about being honest. You see sometimes they present these stories and you go, nobody believes this. The vast majority of people don't believe this. And if you're not prepared to take risks In a creative industry As an artist You're done It doesn't matter Even if you're doing observational material You still need to take risks I just don't understand This whole thing is like You're not allowed to say It's right wing But the left is allowed to say it's right wing They'll look at my comedy and go It's far right It's anti-woke But if you yourself are right wing Openly Then you're not allowed to do that why can't we the right if they want to continue being empowering in america and if they want to be in power in europe and stuff like that they have to kind of unfortunately use some of the tactics of the left at least in being loud and annoying um to win because otherwise the other side will just be louder and more annoying with less people and you know it's like you're not allowed to say at a workplace if you work for a bank and you're in the office and you go you know what i like ice let's get rid of more people i think they shouldn't be here that's not allowed you could be fired but if you come in and say we need to get rid of ice i would i think we need to go around and round up the ice agents and put them in jail and take away their rights that's fine so that's not right and generally my comedy is existing for the people who are frustrated about that to have some cathartic relief and laugh about the current state of the lack of freedom of speech and they should be allowed to do it they should be allowed to go to the show they should be allowed to laugh at it and if they're not then it's getting more serious you know it's it's there the left is making this more serious than it has to be they they claim some of the the nimo bc we're canceling the show for the safety of the community it's a comedy show what safety are you worried about well we're worried that some of the words in there are going to raise everybody laughing at those jokes already agrees with those things so you're just saying that they're not allowed to agree or they're not allowed to laugh and now you're actually making it more dangerous because now you have 900 people who live in your community you canceled their favorite thing that they were going to go do now they're pissed off Now they might go out into the community and say something crazy to who knows what at some bus stop and be like, you know, start instead of biting their tongue.

50:36If they went to my show and laughed about it, they'd look at it and just go, whatever. But I would I would disagree with what you said to say that they agree with your points of view. One of my favorite comedians who you probably have never heard of is a guy called Jerry Sadowitz. Jerry Sadowitz is one of the most brilliant comedians to ever grace the stage. And what Jerry Sadowitz does is he plays this character of the most pathetic, awful human being that you could ever see. He is the lowest of the low. And because of that, he does jokes about everyone that are really dark, really hateful, really offensive.

51:09He got cancelled from the Edinburgh Festival because people got upset. You know, the standard stuff. I don't agree with what Jerry Sadowitz says. I go to watch Jerry Sadowitz.

51:21Francis Foster:Why does everybody have to say this? No, no, no, no. I don't agree with it. I like it. France is making a different point. I don't know what his jokes were. The point he's trying to make is Jerry Sadowitz is not expressing his fucking opinion on stage. He's telling jokes. Right. And there's a big fucking difference. Yeah. A character telling jokes and a person expressing their opinions. Now, in your case, I think they're much more closely aligned. But France's point is sometimes it's just a joke. So, for instance, one of Jerry Sadowitz's jokes is Gary Glitter is the greatest rock star of our generation.

51:52He should be allowed to fuck who he wants, when he wants, how he wants. Gary Glitter is a pedophile who got arrested in Thailand. But the whole purpose of Jerry is that I'm going to say the most dark, outrageous, awful stuff, which is indefensible on any level. But I'm going to express it beautifully. I'm going to write it immaculately. And I'm going to deliver it phenomenally well so that you have to laugh despite you knowing full well that what I'm saying is... is awful. But do you see what I mean? You know how at the beginning of every year, people say, this is a year things change. Then by February, everything looks the same.

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53:55Francis Foster:As you grow, Shopify grows with you. Handle more orders, expand into new markets, and manage everything from one simple dashboard. In 2026, stop waiting and start selling with Shopify. Sign up for your£1 a month trial and start selling today at shopify.co.uk slash trigger. Go to shopify.co.uk slash trigger. That's shopify.co.uk slash trigger. I say things that I don't mean. Every comic does that. I mean, some of the things I do mean, but like not to the extreme of like, you know, the Renee Good, do I think it was actually good? No. And I talk about, it's like her name was good. That's why it's funny.

54:35Yeah. If her name was, you know, some other random last name and you just said, I'm glad, like it doesn't, or good, it doesn't make sense. So yeah, of course the jokes, you know, are, are exaggerated over the top, but to laugh at them, you have to be in agreeance with something. You have to be in agreeance with me that I'm telling you a joke and that you're not going to, to, to, to be offended at it. You don't necessarily have to agree politically, but you have to agree to something you're making. When you go into a comedy show, you're, there's a con, there's an unwritten contract of, I'm going to tell the jokes and if you don't like it, you don't have to laugh.

55:13If you really don't like it, you can leave. You can't yell out. You can't cause problems during the show. And you understand that I am joking. Do you get a lot of people heckling you?

55:28Normal amount. People are really excited for my shows. They get really drunk. They get really drunk and then they end up heckling. um but they loved me you know what i'm saying and then i have yeah if i go to a random place and do a show somebody might freak out and get mad and um but you know i just don't understand this whole like it's like why do you have to explain that you're like that pedophile joke it's like why do you have to explain that you're against it like it's like obviously you know i'm saying like i i do epstein jokes and it's like somebody got mad at mothership i made a joke because i was saying that um you know whatever that he was a good guy you know so why is that but it's funny because it's obviously not true right yeah you know i'm saying now some of my jokes are funny because they are true or maybe that maybe maybe epstein was a good guy but you know like people he made jokes about indigenous people in canada oh so you're not allowed to you're not allowed to talk about a group of canadians that i'm i'm born and raised in canada grew up with the whole learn the history blah blah and i still can't make a joke well if you knew the history you'd know it's not funny oh give me a freaking break let me deal with what's funny you deal with what's serious you know i'm saying or i'll have to come over there and tell you what's serious and then they won't like that that won't be very funny i don't imagine they will no they'll be scared shitless if i was in power in canada full power would be scared shitless of me.

56:58I mean, you've got a glint in your eye when you say that. I'm going to have to do it. I'm going to have to maybe 10, 15 years from now. We'll see. How did Canada get in this mess? This is a question that I've actually wanted to ask Canadians. I mean, look at Europe. It's the same problem. Do you think it's the same problem? Yeah. It's the same civilization. What's the problem? The problem is over-empathy and feeling bad for people that we shouldn't feel bad for and you know letting in millions and millions of immigrants into the country that have completely different views hate the west want to change the west want to implement sharia law want to implement um you know okay we'll split up the west basically okay this is the sharia part this is the lgbtq plus uh trans part uh this is the uh hindu part and then there's a little sliver for the people who yeah you remember your country this is where you go so and when you do that and you have people in power so that the lgbtq plus people created all these woke rules that now ultra uh is like islamists are taking advantage of right so their rules were originally like we're just gay we just want to be gay we don't want anybody to make fun of us and we don't want to get our feelings hurt we want to be able to shake our dicks in front of kids and do drag queen story hour and all this stuff and then the islamists are like coming in going oh my god if they're falling for this they'll fall for our stuff you know that if oh and then they can say whatever they want and anybody who says anything to me that's discrimination based on the laws that the gay people pass and now so it's and and another reason that all this nonsense because normal regular people are busy doing comedy and podcasts instead of politics because we don't want to we thought we could just live in a country and be successful and follow our dreams and the people who didn't think that was the case are now in power right so they don't

59:03Francis Foster:want you to live in your life they want to be in your shit they want to be in your business i think we need to make being in politics cool again for the cool people and the cool people might need to go back into politics and start saying what they really want to say and pushing what they really want instead of just being at home shaking their head going oh this is horrible anyway got to go to work yeah it's a good point actually we need to get back to the era of jfk where you could basically be a cool president and have sex with marilyn monroe nothing wrong with it nothing wrong with being a cool president nothing wrong with being a cool prime minister um and you know keir starmer is so not that and he's so he's so aggressively uh so aggressively woke and so you know i've never seen him laugh or smile he takes everything super seriously everything is hello to the british people this is one of the worst there's no fun where's the fun when's the last time a politician talked about have fun when's the last time a politician said But we need to care about families and worry about the health and longevity and the love.

1:00:14The left has hijacked love. They now, like bad money, I am against, I am, love is stronger than I hate. First of all, no, it's not. But second of all. Yeah, historically speaking, I think you're onto something. but why does the community who aborts kids wants to have trans as their kids uh doesn't really or doesn't have kids or doesn't want kids why are they the community of love and it's all about what's when they when the left says love what they really mean is allowing illegal immigration to happen unfettered nobody should check it uh love is uh you know we have to loving our trans community need loving what about but the left the right is the one who actually loves they love their family they love their country they would die for their country die for their family protect their family like i have kids i love my kids you're telling me that the love that the lgbtq plus community has for each other is stronger than the love that people have for their children like what are we doing here they're not the arbiter of truth they're not the arbiter of love and if anything the left is the hateful, evil side of things now that has disregarded God.

1:01:34I mean, you don't have to be religious to believe in God. We're on a rock spitting in the middle of a galaxy in a universe we don't understand, swimming in some sort of soup that we're all in, that we can't see, that we breathe in. Something insane is going on on Earth, and when you're thinking about these trivial, well, he said a joke that I didn't like, And does he not know how serious it is that women historically have been marginalized?

1:02:10Francis Foster:Ben Bankas and Theo Von and Francis Foster. is so being... I was trying to give him benefit. No, but this is what I don't... I did a debate with this Destiny guy and I met some of his audience and it radicalized me. Because these people, they just, they don't... Like you said, they don't want to do the work that it takes to achieve anything. But a lot of them also maybe just can't. And so they are stuck in loser-ville and because of that, they hate everyone who isn't. Well, that's why they side with Hamas. they side with like terrorist organizations because like you said they feel that well i'm not good i can't become anything so let's just burn it all down and let's just you know uh let's let's not like you know i hate elon because he's a billionaire because he works and i hate this person i hate that person it's like you know if you're if you're not waking up every day going how do i become more successful or how do i fix something how do i improve my life improving your own life will do more for the country than marching around with a sign uh trying to get a comedy show canceled or trying to get anything canceled and that goes for both sides like if you're on the right and you really you're you're out of protest i get it but like be successful start a business buy some pool cleaning equipment uh clean your room clean your room but i'm saying buy some pool cleaning equipment and create a pool business that cleans pools and do something it's not that hard to start a business than to be successful and my message to the left is the opposite of yours in a way that because i want them to snap out of it i do think they're capable of doing great things but they have to put down the sign push the put down the phone and focus on something and i know i and i sound like a parent maybe a parent that they never had or the parent they did have that they resent but this is what's going on right now is the right needs to parent the left and they need to basically say hey like you said this no you're ruining the country you're destroying everything you have to stop and if they don't what what do we do what is the consequence we just have no more uh you know canada will have no comedy shows cancel everything unless you're a government funded comedian like in the soviet union like my dad he's he's from the soviet union former soviet union lithuania and he talks when he watches the cbc in canada he goes this is soviet like the level of propaganda it's it's legit so no comedy's comedy if you don't like it don't go uh and as for everything else show me one thing where the left has improved anything like one thing the coffee that's true it's coffee look I'm look it's at the very end at after all the uh the human trafficking and the in the in the colombian forest jungle and the children picking at the tree and the bing bing bing and then and then finally and then it's processed but at a plant with a bunch of probably republican people working at it and it and the companies and then finally in the last second some woke person goes do you want uh do you want americano or do you want howl milk okay yeah but you can't deny it conservatives are terrible at making coffee and also they're terrible at making movies And they're terrible at making breakfast.

1:06:06Francis Foster:Really? Yeah, conservative breakfasts are terrible. What's a conservative breakfast? Oh, you know, it's heavy and it's stodgy and it's just... Wait, what about the English breakfast? Surely that's conservative because it's traditional, right? The English... Have you ever had an English... You look like you've had an English breakfast. You look like you're enjoying English breakfast. What is it? What do you mean? It's bad. Shwarmer? Get out. Get out. No, it's like tea and crumpets, right? Yeah, yeah, tea and crumpets. Well, no, it's black pudding. Sausage, egg, bacon, baked beans, hash brown, all that good stuff.

1:06:39Yeah, I've had that.

1:06:40Francis Foster:That's a conservative breakfast, surely. Yeah. When you come to basically Canada Mark II, which is the UK. What movies have conservatives made that are bad? Because the pushback to that is Clint Eastwood is a conservative. He's made some great movies. Yeah. The issue is that conservatives don't want to make movies. The ones that would be good at it are making money doing something else, owning a you know a some random company that does pool cleaning or you know and they never they just made their money they're like I'm not going to get into movies you know what my hope is is that we reached the peak of this in politics with Justin Trudeau who was the wokest of the woke of the woke and you talk about Canada and I think what we're doing is we're not being really honest in a way because your population voted for Trudeau who was the literal worst you know what was what did he say once when he went amen and he said a woman that wasn't him though wasn't it him no it's some American senator mail-in ballot I mean I'm not a conspiracy guy fully but I know that mail-in ballots were huge in that election because it was COVID you know pierre poliev again he didn't push hard enough he should have he didn't push hard enough against everything and he made a lot of conservatives vote for this other party that is like more right and that's why they lost because if they had not had that other party they would have voted for him and he wouldn't want so um the idea that everybody supported him is not true.

1:08:21The people who vote, he won from the people who vote. The people who don't vote didn't vote. Why didn't they vote? Well, because the conservative guy didn't make them want to vote. I mean, that's absolutely fair. Do you think that we're going to see Canada get better? Do you have hope for Canada? I have hope. I think that me doing my shows is helping. I mean, I do, because when they happen, it gives people hope. They cancel two and then we're still going to do three. This weekend, I have six sold out in Niagara Falls and then sold out in Lethbridge, Alberta, sold out in Cranbrook, BC, sold out in Campbell River, BC, sold out in Kelowna, BC.

1:09:05And when those shows happen, people see it and they feel hope that the country is what it used to be. And they think that they're going to cancel shows and it's somehow going to like get rid of me it's like you're literally you know making me bigger you're making me more people who haven't heard of me go who are these people complaining about these people that i hate who are they complaining about then they see it's me and they go oh i love oh i can't believe i never heard of this guy where when is he performing okay i'm gonna go get tickets so yeah thank you to the haters and keep people in the venues, you know, do your thing, and they're trying to get the shows canceled because they have nothing better to do.

1:09:50And really what they're doing is me a huge favor, so. Mira, te voy a decir una cosa. Si aprendes un idioma solo con libros, te vas a quedar atascado. Lo que de verdad marca la diferencia es escuchar como habla la gente en contextos reales. If you didn't understand that, but you want to, then listen up. If you did, apologies. I'm about to repeat myself. If you learn a language only from a book, you're going to hit a ceiling. What actually changes everything is hearing how people really speak in real situations. That's why I genuinely recommend Lingopie. I'm fluent in Spanish and immersion is what got me there.

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1:11:10It's dramatic, intense, very emotional, bit like my love life. And it's brilliant for picking up the kinds of expressions and turns of phrase you never meet in a textbook. You start noticing how people actually argue, confess things, exaggerate, all in real Spanish, at full speed. They've got 3000 plus shows and movies across 14 languages. And you can use it on your phone, laptop or TV, which makes sticking with it much easier. And consistency is the whole game. If you want to learn a language the way people actually speak it, click the link in the description for 55 % off an annual plan. If you want to understand the language the way it's actually spoken, this is one of the best ways to do it I've ever seen.

1:11:56So once again, click the link in the description or go to learn.lingopie.com slash trigonometry. Because the concern is, Ben, is that the people who are entrepreneurial, the people who are on the right, the people who want to achieve things, build things, they're going to leave Canada because, quite frankly, why would you stay? They already have. A lot of them already have. I mean, I ran into, I mean, when I'm in Canada, I do get recognized on the street. I ran into two people in Yorkville, um, just crossing the street. And the one guy was a young guy, tall guy. And he was like, love everything you're doing.

1:12:34You know, thank you for, for being brave enough to just do what you're doing. And, um, and he's like, you live in the States mostly. I'm like, yeah. And he's like, man, I was just in Scottsdale. So nice. It's so good. I just, I want to get down. Everybody wants to go, um, because they're the regular normal people who aren't woke can't handle it anymore and that's part of the part of the goal of the woke in my opinion is to make it so horrible that the people they hate leave which is successful people who's gonna pay all the taxes when that happens they don't care they just borrow money it's all fake they just keep borrowing from whoever in china and they do that they have some system where they they buy the bonds back from themselves and to print the money and i forget i don't know i'm not a finance, but I know that it's not good.

1:13:25It's not sustainable, but they want this, this world. And then they have more crime and more poverty and more starvation and all these problems. And then they have, eventually they're going to have nobody but themselves to blame. So it might, maybe it will be a 30 year thing where they go full, full communist and everybody, any dissenters are either arrested or have to leave. And then when finally the new generation of woke people go, wait, it's like, why is everything like this? I don't like this. Then it'll change because the people now are brainwashed to the extreme. They are. The people who, like you said, there's more of them.

1:14:07I don't know if there's more, but they're loud and they're super brainwashed and they believe it so much that they'll do anything. They'll do anything to shut things down, including violence. Because it's so bizarre, because Canada should be one of the most successful, richest nations on the planet. When you look at the resources that you have, you should be literally top five, top six richest nations. And you look at the population as well, who are super educated. Your universities are incredibly prestigious. You've got literally everything. They've all been infiltrated. All the universities are infiltrated by China and super...

1:14:53I mean, part of ultra-woke is China, I believe, that they knew, they studied, how do we destroy the West? And they go, let's woke and then immigration... Ben, look, Ben, you can't do the... Without doing the accent, come on. We need to make the gay people in charge of the country. and then fill the country with muslims and then then we can have control of the farm ranch but that's really they um what they want is is is control it's all about control part of the apology stuff and not like why did they cancel all those pipelines where they could have been pumping gas to the entire world and canada could have been a leader in natural gas and oil production or whatever, getting it out of the ground because of woke, because it's environmentally not friendly and because the indigenous people and because of this.

1:15:51But although the environment and the indigenous people would be better taken care of if Canada was rich, it's the same thing. It's the same. I'm going to hold the sign up and say I'm for this instead of I'm going to forget about all that, focus on my business, get rich, and then maybe have an opinion about something once I'm a prominent individual. So Canada decided, let's not be a prominent country. Let's stand up for all these BS woke takes. So there's no pipeline. Now they're giving all the land back to the indigenous people that are already impoverished. And sorry to say, a lot of them are, you know, they're not in great shape.

1:16:31And what is the reason for that? They've been given billions of dollars. Why are they not in great shape? Well, they need the land back. Okay, here's the land. Oh, they're still not in great shape. What do they need? Well, they need to make sure that there's no freedom of speech so nobody can talk badly about them and then they'll be okay and then they're destroying good countries and it's coming from these people who are brainwashed maybe by china maybe you know the tiktoks i don't know what it is but i'm against it i want canada to be a great safe amazing place to raise your families to you should be able to have the school should not be filled with political stuff and political i mean transgender ideology and all that stuff which imagine having to learn about transgender ideology a week after there was a trans person who shot up school and there's people dead and then the next the first class back they're like well we need to first of all let's acknowledge the land we're on it's all fake it's all meant to make you insane it's all meant to make you angry so that you hopefully i think their main goal is that you do something crazy and then they can really now we're strapped well

1:17:40Francis Foster:you mentioned a good place for families how are you finding being a dad i love being a dad i think everybody should be a parent i think that you grow up and a lot of these people who are out there protesting who have no kids no nothing no job no no responsibilities it's like you didn't grow up once you have a kid that's when you have your own kid you deal with your own traumas from when you grew up or whatever. You remember, oh, that's why my dad was mad because this and that. Everything starts to make sense. It's healing. It's a healing thing to have your own family. And these people who want to destroy that and take away, first of all, the first way they destroy it, well, women need to work too.

1:18:27They want women's rights. but what they really mean is they want women to work as hard as men and then also be taken care of like they're women it's like you can't have both you can't have both and women like staying at home and taking care of kids i guess not all women do i get it not women not all women but there's nobody's forcing you to do that but people are forcing other people to go to work because the economy is getting so horrible that it's like, in Canada at least, you can't do it. In America you can't. There's more and more state-owned moms every day.

1:19:06Francis Foster:Well, the evidence is very clear. Statistically speaking, most women would prefer the opportunity to stay at home with their kids for a lot longer than they get to. And now there's these women in their 50s and they're like, my kids, I just don't know what happened to them. They were so sweet. What happened is you didn't stay home and you sent them to some school and you made a false reality of what they're working towards. And their whole goal is to get 85 average so they can get into some university so that they can go there and have sex with a million people. And then after that, they can hopefully go into the workforce.

1:19:37And then hopefully they meet a guy by 35. And then hopefully, it's all bullshit. The reason why people used to get married so young, I think, and why it makes more sense is because you actually can love somebody then. You know, like think about your first and second loves versus you know dating in your 30s or dating in your 40s or 50s that's why those marriages lasted they met young they had kids young they grew up in their 20s they didn't grow up in their 40s like now it's like people are i'm adulting you're 43 like you should have had a kid at 20 i mean i wish i had kids earlier and i had a kid at 30 but i would have maybe you know maybe it was the right time but either way 30 is still young nowadays but my message to people who love me and love my comedy is thank you love yourself forget about these people do what you need to do stand up don't forget about them in the sense that don't let them ruin your day but if you're if you need to stand up to somebody or say something in public like do it don't break the law but like if somebody's clearly woke and has a mask on and is like causing a scene be like hey tell them people don't agree with you you should know that people need people need to tell people that are pushing this ideology that they're wrong to their face because they don't they don't go out and see that they're so protected from getting the other opinion online they oh oh, no, block, block, block.

1:21:16Oh, I don't look at any of that stuff. I, you know, even some of the announcements, they'll make an announcement, you know, trying to get, we here at the Homosexual Society of whatever town are trying to get Ben Bankers to show, and then the first comment is, we have muted comments to protect the members of the LGBT, what are we talking, so there's no debate. No debate. Have a debate. I'm on the verge, I was thinking, like, maybe I should, in some of these towns, like, should I just do a show where I invite people who hate me on stage and like debate them or something like those shows would that make them not what like maybe like don't cancel the show you can come you can come and go on stage and try to debate me in front of my crowd see how it works I can see why you'd want to do that yeah it'll be really fun yeah some good clips yeah for you it'd be fun for them it'd be horrible but that's the point that's the point because they want

1:22:10Francis Foster:attention okay let's give you attention and did you have any uh any funny thoughts on iran and what's happening there i mean only horrible thoughts all right next funny thoughts on iran there's you know people are against it i i don't i don't know i think that we need to blow some people up that's a very mega point of view mega loves the war yeah well not all of it but look 85 % of America. I've been saying we should blow up. We should blow up everybody because they don't like us. Well, they want to blow us up, but it's the same thing. It's like woke. It's like, you can make fun of me, but if I make fun of you, oh, that's bad.

1:22:57So, and I guess it's different because people are dying. Apparently. So you're not pro Ayatollah? I'm not pro Ayatollah. he's kind of dead so it's hard to be look this was something that was going to happen whether it was

1:23:13Francis Foster:now or in 20 years or in 50 years you can't have around having nuclear weapons but i mean the rest of it is complicated also i mean this is my intellectual people on the left supported the war in ukraine they support ukraine against russia they want ukraine to win they still have the ukrainian thing in their bio and they go america needs to step up and help us And we, America did. I mean, I say we, because I live here or not, because I'm American. But I mean, Canada helped too. They sent some helmets. But America gave billions, right? Or trillions to the Ukraine push to fight back against Russia.

1:23:54And it's not enough. And the Europeans are saying, it's not enough. We need to do more. So America goes, all right, let's blow the shit out of Iran. Because they're giving Russia.

1:24:04Francis Foster:That actually helps Ukraine massively. It's huge. Right, because the Iranians can't send their drones to Russia anymore. The Iranians are sending military equipment to Russia. They're sending energy, gas, oil, everything to Russia. They support Russia. America goes in, blows the shit out of Iran, and everybody's like, this is an illegal war. It's like, but we're helping the guy. This is how we, you got to think outside the box. What, are we just going to go into full force into Ukraine and get all of Europe nuked? No, let's go in and attack their weakest, their weakest ally that's supplying them with stuff.

1:24:41So the Democrats should be happy. And secretly, some of them know this and they're going, oh, this actually does help the Ukraine poll. And, you know, Zelensky is on board with it. And. And here Starmer goes. He somebody he probably realized this two days too late because the first day he's like, we do not stand with them because we want to make sure the Muslims don't riot here. and then two days later he goes oh this is good for ukraine we got it let's join in and he goes we're gonna join and the and trump goes we don't need uh allies jumping in when we already won the war and it's such an interesting thing to see that so america played it so good trump played it so good that the europeans where is america helping us with ukraine we need to help billions of dollars from ukraine and america was saying spend your own money more you need to up your military budget.

1:25:33They weren't doing it. And then finally America goes, okay, well, I'm going to help you, but in a different way, are you going to help me? And they go, no. So the countries want help from America to fight off Russia, but they won't help America to fight off Russia in an out of the box way because they're not smart enough to realize what's going on. There's a lot of high level stuff going on and a lot of smart people are behind closed doors. And I think they have a i think they got a hold of it i think he uh mr secretary of war pete hegseth is also very very good he's he's a he's a genius uh in in some ways i know that people would disagree with that and hey don't judge a book by its cover but he's uh not that he i mean people think he they're like he's not i'm like he's clearly smart he knows what he's doing and i have faith in those people and if it goes wrong i would say something or if i disagreed i would say something but so far the only thing i disagree with in the iran war is the amount of fake news that the left like are they're supporting this ai like fake worse footage and being like welcome israel's getting pounded it's like that's literally ai like you guys have lost your minds you're literally posting ai and pretending like something's happening that's not.

1:26:50So that's bad. Ben, it's been an absolute pleasure having you on the show. I can't even say it with a straight face. Yeah, he has. You're like, holy shit. That's really Ben Magnus. Final question is always the same. What's the one thing we're not talking about that we really should be?

1:27:07Francis Foster:Before Ben answers the final question, at the end of the interview, make sure to go to triggerpod.co.uk where you'll see this. Are there things you poke fun at in the relatively safe surroundings of Austin that you might be a little more circumspect of in the woke environs of Toronto. Who would Muslim extremists have to kill for you to believe that their intentions are benevolent? What's the one thing we're not talking about that we really should be?

1:27:35Francis Foster:Jews. We didn't talk about the Jews enough. Quite a lot of people talk about Jews now. You're a Jewish background, right? No. You won't admit to it in the current climate. i mean my dad was uh jew is like he's not religious he's not yeah he's not religious but right he was born in lithuania right after the second world war so his parents used to be probably just a little bit more than bored born oh born yeah he was born yeah he was born yeah look people my opinions people can't handle my opinion but my opinion is that for the most Jews created a lot of good things that we use today and I don't hate them I think that's controversial to say I don't hate Jews at all I like them people are going to be mad about this I do I agree with you I said are there a lot of people are going to be mad about this i don't know i get sometimes people are like like i'll have like the best bit and be like was funny but then i researched and found out he's a jew so not funny it's like what does that even mean and i'm not i don't go to synagogue i don't know how to speak hebrew i don't know anything um are you good with money i mean i'm making money there you go and that's the most important thing in this world is to take care of yourself and your family and to have faith in some sort of higher power because you're going to need that.

1:29:09You're going to need that. If you're fighting off millions of people who hate you, you're going to need the power of the universe to do that. My goal is to become the biggest comic in the world. Or Prime Minister of Canada. Well, that's the same thing. But to become Prime Minister, you've got to become... Canada's never had a famous, already famous, prime minister besides trudeau but he wasn't famous for something he did himself um so maybe that's maybe that's the future but for now we're going to sell out everything and we're going to have my shows people have the best time of their lives so we'll see you there well you're doing

1:29:53Francis Foster:very well man so congratulations and thanks for coming on head on over to triggerpod.co.uk where where we ask Ben your questions. What conversations have you had with other comedians that have experienced cancellation, i.e. Shane Gillis, Tony Hinchcliffe, et cetera? Have they given you any advice? This is behind the paywall? Yeah.

1:30:29Thank you.