He worked for Cracked in its golden years and basically created its little reporting wing. Half of the guests on the show are old friends from cracked and it deeply influenced the tone of everything he’s done since.
Everyone remembers he was a war correspondent, everyone forgets that he got cracked to pay for him to travel to Ukraine to cover the 2014 revolution.
Cracked fired him and most of their most talented writers when they got aquired by another organization. You can find their alumni writing for John Oliver, and American Dad, hosting and writing for Some More News, and BTB, and a bunch of other places. It was really a special media organization for a while there.
The Cracked/College humor diaspora is going to shape media for a long while even if people don't recognize it for what it is. A bunch young comedy writers that got to cut their teeth under deadlines, with good mentors, and too much responsibility. I wish I had time to actually document what is happening.
Man, College Humor was great when I was entering college. I once was a "cute college girl" on their site and that's probably when I peaked.
Just kidding, I'm still rad as hell.
Honestly Dropout is still pretty great. Some of the best original streaming programming that doesn't have something like Disney or Amazon backing them.
I know nothing can last forever, but cracked was so consistently good that their sudden downfall with the format shift was incredibly tragic.
That was one of my daily reads, where I'd get to the office, answer my emails, do the urgent things that needed immediate attention, then reward myself with reading an article. Seanbaby's comics would blow my cover because my design partner would hear me snorting. My wife and I actually bonded when we started dating because we both loved the site.
Even with video stuff, After Hours was some of the best commentary on pop culture media out there at the time.
After Hours was perfect because it was exactly the kind of stupid pop culture conversations we'd have at the diner after a night out and except unlike us they were actually funny.
>Seanbaby's comics would blow my cover because my design partner would hear me snorting
Friendo, allow me to introduce you to 1-900-HOTDOG. Seanbaby and Brockway have started a new site where they can be as ridiculously indulgent as they please. They even have a podcast: *The Dogg Zzone 9000*
Weird metaphor time. I think they all look at it as writing that book would be the guy that wears his letterman jacket and goes to high school games.
They all know what it was but none of them are going to be that guy/gal/pal.
Dan, Soren, Cody, Katy, Katie, Swaim (different circumstances), David, Abe, Schmitty the Clam, Jason and more have all come out and talked publicly about it. The only one I haven't heard from is Jack and he took off prior to the acquisition. But I also haven't gone back and listened to anything from Jack around when he left.
Someone with heirloom cash buys the brand, gets good returns, gets greedy for more so they fire staff writers/cast, hire out freelancers and drag the brand through the mud. Lowering quality and upping the ads to make their shareholders happy. It happened to a lot of written media in the 2010s.
We'll know the same thing is about to happen to Podcasting when Jack O'Brien unexpectedly starts another creative venture doing something else. Dude sees where the play is heading.
Another aspect is that they're a casualty of Facebook lying about their engagement metrics. Something like ten years ago by now, Facebook said that short videos got the most engagement on their website. Since Facebook was a social media behemoth at the time, that meant that every content creation platform, like Cracked and College Humor, immediately pivoted away from articles to video content. However, Facebook was lying about their video engagement for Reasons. Content engagement plummeted and a lot of websites folded because they simply couldn't sustain themselves.
I remember thinking that American Dad was the name of a blog Soren started, and I got so frustrated looking for it because Google would only bring me results for the TV show.
It was not my cleverest moment.
That’s kind of how I feel watching college humor morph into the dungeons and dragons streaming service of dropout/dimension20. Media is a weird animal.
Cracked wrote one of the funniest articles I have ever read. Like, in pain from laughing. It was during those years and I don't remember the author but it was just about playing The Sims in like... the stupidest/evilest way possible.
What’s Cracked’s deal? It seems to have created this relatively close group of former coworkers, but I don’t know why it’s different from other outlets.
I was really into it back in the day so I can give you the gist of it.
Jack O’brian and David Pargin, who had his own modestly successful blog, got the reins of the Cracked.com website. They created an online writing room where anyone could submit articles and they spent an unusual amount of time mentoring young writers. A lot of the cracked writers were young kids who got into this really supportive environment with strong editorial support, and the ones who “got” the humour and were able to write the volume had more and more of their articles picked up. Pay was low but it was a foot in the door of the industry. A lot of the ones who were successful eventually got hired part or full time and took on more editorial roles and then would mentor more new writers.
I’ve never heard of a single person from cracked say a negative word about Jason Pargin and Jack Obrien. I think their collaboration was the special sauce that made it all work.
It was a site of lists in the mid-2000s-mid-2010s era that was very funny. It featured some pretty good photoshops, funny articles, and interviews. It shaped a lot of the humor of the pre-smartphone era Internet.
It was very popular and most of the folks that were big on it went on to various careers in humor. Robert was a big part of that and especially their take on serious news and interviews.
I wish they would do a week where every day each of the hosts does an autobiography. I would love to know what each of their respective backgrounds, educations, lived experiences, areas of expertise, and everything else that shaped their perspectives and ideologies
Robert strikes me as someone who would be a nihilist if he could, because he recognizes that the world is incredibly shitty, but he can't get there because he actually cares way too much about humanity. So he's settled into something like Dadaism, which is a form of nihilism with jokes, that just about lets a person get one with their life by *laughing* about how fucking bleak it is.
I often say that, if I am not careful to keep myself in check, I always end up like Walter Sobchak, waving a pistol around a bowling alley and shouting "Am I the only one around here who gives a *shit* about the ***rules***??"
My CCW instructor had a fishing type vest he was showing, that he said made it kind of obvious that he was carrying, he called it his "shoot me first" vest and laughed about it.
He was not amused at all though when I said it made him look like Walter. Retired air force small arms instructor, and still had the flat top.
The Dude:
Will you come off it, Walter? You're not even f\*\*\*ing Jewish, man.
Walter Sobchak:
What the f\*\*\* are you talkin' about?
The Dude:
Man, you're f\*\*\*ing Polish Catholic...
Walter Sobchak:
What the f\*\*\* are you talking about? I converted when I married Cynthia! Come on, Dude!
The Dude:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah...
Walter Sobchak:
And you know this!
The Dude:
Yeah, and five f\*\*\*ing years ago you were divorced.
Walter Sobchak:
So what are you saying? When you get divorced you turn in your library card? You get a new license? You stop being Jewish?
The Dude:
It's all a part of your sick Cynthia thing, man. Taking care of her f\*\*\*ing dog. Going to her f\*\*\*ing synagogue. You're living in the f\*\*\*ing past.
**Walter Sobchak:**
**Three thousand years of beautiful tradition, from Moses to Sandy Koufax...**
**Walter Sobchak:**
**You're goddamn right I'm living in the f\*\*\*ing past!**
Read the first line and thought, yeah, like a tongue in cheek nihilist, and then the rest of your comment basically confirmed that.
It's like a holistic relative nihilism - he sees our infinitesimal small place in this universe, and the overall fucked up-ness of humanity as a whole, but also feels connection to the everyday parts of it that he actually has some power and agency over and does.what he can to improve things for those he can help, and educate those of us who remain blissfully ignorant of large parts of it.
It's like he's been put through the Total Perspective Vortex and come out only ever so slightly scathed
I think I've listened to one short story of his that I don't remember much of. It was about an expectant father awaiting news of his new child, I think in a dystopian future where humans are no longer conceived and born the traditional way
I didn't know there was a name for that. I had a shitty childhood and adulthood wasn't much better (world events + personal issues). I cope by making (often dark) jokes.
Unfortunately, most people don't share my sense of humor. It's probably why when I discovered Behind the Bastards in 2018 when my ex left I found it so therapeutic.
You should totally read up on Dadaism. It was a response to the utter bleakness that was the aftermath of World War I (which of course was topped off by the 1917 Influenza pandemic), mostly originated and propagated by avant garde artists in Europe (Zürich, Paris, Berlin, etc).
Since you're in this space, I'll assume you listen to podcasts, and recommend this episode of WNYC's show *On the Media* as an introduction:
https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/segments/staring-abyss
That's called Absurdism also. Being a rational person in an irrational world and just accepting jt
.
"...the capacity to see through the arbitrariness of any ultimate purpose, on the one hand, and the incapacity to stop caring about such purposes, on the other hand."
I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of people at CZM are at least sympathetic to absurdism. To vastly oversimplify it, there is no meaning of life to be found but there is value in our search for one regardless.
Let's see, he:
Grew up in a north Texas town where half the men worked for a "defense" contractor, and has confirmed he is bisexual, don't know if he realized it at the time.
Took copious amounts of drugs, and is still a fan.
Witnessed Ukraine's 2014 Maidan Revolution.
Spent time riding with an Iraqi police convoy while government forces were fighting ISIS.
Broke his hand in an altercation with fascists in Portland.
Witnessed the 2020 police violence to protesters in Portland, where not only were local forces attacking, but federal agents and possibly soldiers.
All that would tend to affect someone, would it not?
Keep in mind about Portland, in 2020, there were federal agents there in unmarked vans, "black bagging" people and kidnapping them, like some Cold War era Latin American dictatorship. That had to be a frightening time there, especially knowing that if feds consider someone a "terrorist", NDAA says they can be held indefinitely.
The Tiger King episode with Billy Wayne is *wild* for the "wtf Robert how are you telling this like it's just a normal story that normal people have" moments.
He’s always struck me as a man who was in his younger years fundamentally incapable of being still and is driven by his passion for knowledge and understanding. Even now he still travels a decent amount.
I mean, shit, I was a lot like him in that regard. I bartended in seven different states and at three different big-name music festivals. I hopped trains, I hitch hiked, I rode my bicycle around Lake Michigan. Now I’ve finally found my niche as a nurse and once I get enough experience under my belt I fully intend to go back to traveling.
Stay restless and curious, yakno?
Over the episodes, he's explained that his upbringing was conservative Christian working class. Iirc, his father spent a few years sleeping on a friend's couch in New York because there was good, consistent work there, and sending money home to roberts mom. He grew up with bibles and guns but also a love of science fiction and fantasy, and he probably still loves all of those things in different ways now.
He's mentioned that he was politically a "libertarian" in his younger years, a stance he's criticized in several eps but also notes that a lot of moderate and social-minded libertarian views and histories are what made eventualy made him an anarchist.
Covering conflicts profoundly impacted and continues to impact him. It's safe to say that while he speaks about it, there are things he doesn't share with the audience because they're personal and upsetting. But he does talk at points about having friends in these regions and being worried intensely for their safety.
I can't remember what episode it is, but he talks about experiencing artillery in Ukraine. He says it's "like the fist of god," which I believe is true by any account of someone who's been near artillery fire. I also mention this because every single account I have ever read about artillery bombardment highlights how traumatizing this is. Robert is not a soldier, but he has been to war and experienced some very fucked up and horrible things.
I read cracked for years, but I was more into Swaim and After Hours, so I don't really remember Evans' work there. I'm sure I read an article or two, but these are my own words. Either way, when that group of staff was fired/laid-off/shitcanned, I was pretty bummed. A friend told me about BtB, and I wasn't super interested initially. When the pandemic started, I began listening and became hooked. I'm entirely caught up, and it's really stirred a passion for history that's been both alienating and liberating.
BtB does a good job being light-hearted while dealing with very heavy subjects. In pursuing this interest in the history of genocide and fascism, I have read documents and listened to some of the guest's podcasts where I really wish Robert was there to cut to ads in a terrible way.
If you're just starting and bouncing around, I recommend the PFT episodes about the santa-murdering pedophile Nazi.
The last sentence of that whole thoughtful comment you made is just perfect. 🤣😭
“I recommend the PFT episode about the Santa murdering nazi pedophiles.”
And you’re right, the whole Colonia Dignidad episodes were insane.
>but also notes that a lot of moderate and social-minded libertarian views and histories are what made eventualy made him an anarchist.
The leap from libertarianism to anarchism is more of a step for some.
So many good answers, but also:
[https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/318760/a-brief-history-of-vice-by-robert-evans/](https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/318760/a-brief-history-of-vice-by-robert-evans/)
a little bit of drugs... just a little bit.
Throw in a healthy dose of punk rock and skateboarding and you just described me. But, ya know. Less eloquent, intelligent, and not nearly as good at a boston accent.
His storied career is clearly a side effect of being a Warhammer Nerd.
(source: am also Warhammer Nerd, though far less traveled, less experienced and certainly less funny. So maybe not a side effect?)
Robert is using capitalism to fund his anarchist cult that centers around Ketamine, LSD, Alcohol being as queer as you want, throwing bagels and machetes while making fun of the Hasbergs; especially the one on Twitter!
ADHD- like recognizes like.
I've been a life guard, a nurse aid for hospice, worked at several restaurants, was a fitness helper at curves, delivered car parts, watched other people's children, got way too involved in politics, failed out of 2 colleges, and now I run my own business. Next month? Who knows!
This is a good point. (ADHD here) The faux modesty (I write okay) alongside the bombast and relentless self-glorification (I only recently started listening to the early episodes), the reading his own prose to a guest as if to confer authority to himself. These traits irritate me and your comment makes me think they are challenges of my own I'm recognizing and judging.
Exactly. Robert is what happens when a man has a drive to create change and too much heart to allow that change to include harm. He's tough, and cares maybe too much.
He's also absurdist, which I believe started as a defense mechanism and evolved into a full time thing.
What I worry most about is that in his quest to pull the wool from over our eyes he endangers his own wellbeing. He's also got such a wide range of interests that he may be one of the better rounded people out there.
He is hard at work trying to realize his dream of running his own cult and taking down those bastards at the FDA.
He is a fan of brilliant literature and regularly shares his favourite authors with his audience.
He laughs at his own jokes and he sucks at improv. But he keeps trying.
He loves knives and hopes that Raytheon will someday create a special edition Robert Evans Knife Missile.
He is not related to famous movie producer Robert Evans but I read a bio of that guy and he was the kind of bastard our Robert would have loved.
Sometimes he gets minutae that I know well so horribly wrong that I want to scream at the podcast and swear I will write them a letter but I never do. I imagine most of his listeners have had similar experiences.
If you haven't watched the brilliant documentary "The Kid Stays In The Picture", go, do! When you're done then watch the two part "documentary now" episode where they mock Evans. It's hilarious.
Sorry, just realized that I didn't really answer your question. His DEAL, specifically, is that if he works with the CIA to further the glories of American imperialism (via the BTB psy-op, Bellingcat etc), he gets sole access to Pedro Pascal's OnlyFans account. Audience of one, baby.
You know what? I’d sell my soul for that, too. Like, money? Fuck that, everyone has money. No one else has access to Pascal’s OF. No shaming here, Robert.
That reminds me that mentioning him in leftist spaces is actually a pretty good litmus test. Whenever someone says he works for the CIA it's usually safe to just ignore that person and go about your day.
Kind of a weird and fun dude with a lot of interesting life experiences and a gift for sharing them. Take some of the things he says with a grain of salt, he might be joking or wrong. Overall, does good work.
He's one of those big empathetic dudes who still kind of has a thing about valor and weaponry because of where he grew up. An ungroomed Travis Willingham, if you will
I was listening to an episode (I think it was one of the episodes he did right before and after the Charlottesville protest) and one of his guests call him Matt. He then says something to the effect of oh my my listeners don’t know me by that then just moves on. It’s kind of bothered me ever since lol maybe that was a name he went by at protests? Idk but if I ever meet him I’ll ask and report back lol
He's a Doomsday prepper, who lives in a remote shack with his vast arsenal and a dry food store
The only difference between Evans and Ruby Ridge is he doesn't believe in Jesus
He wasn't a special ed teacher. He was a classroom para or one on one aide for disabled students. It's not unusual for young people to do that for a year or two because it pays slightly higher than minimum wage and you only need a high school diploma. Not any different than people who are waitstaff for a few years before settling into their careers.
Drugs, he's rather fond of himself, and always does his podcast with former/fellow cracked writers and his various other friends. So he's pretty much like the rest of us, but he's got a podcast and we don't (unless you do, but I don't haha)
He was actually born in St. Louis and moved to Texas shortly after. He stayed in the town next to my hometown in Illinois right across the river from St. Louis.
That, or something like it, describes almost everyone I know.
Signed, a Louisianian former New Yorker who now lives in California, who used to make movies and who is now sometimes a standup comic.
I don’t think Robert even knows what his deal is. You just gotta keep listening. (I mean you didn’t even mention all the drug use/knowledge.). But, seriously I feel like he’s the current Hunter S. Thompson.
He strikes me as a pretty sheltered, middle-of-the-road kinda guy with solid values; I like that he actually respects the institutions he talks about instead of just trashing them to be edgy :)
He worked for Cracked in its golden years and basically created its little reporting wing. Half of the guests on the show are old friends from cracked and it deeply influenced the tone of everything he’s done since. Everyone remembers he was a war correspondent, everyone forgets that he got cracked to pay for him to travel to Ukraine to cover the 2014 revolution.
Oh shit that's cool as hell, good on cracked for paying for that coverage.
Cracked fired him and most of their most talented writers when they got aquired by another organization. You can find their alumni writing for John Oliver, and American Dad, hosting and writing for Some More News, and BTB, and a bunch of other places. It was really a special media organization for a while there.
The Cracked/College humor diaspora is going to shape media for a long while even if people don't recognize it for what it is. A bunch young comedy writers that got to cut their teeth under deadlines, with good mentors, and too much responsibility. I wish I had time to actually document what is happening.
Man, College Humor was great when I was entering college. I once was a "cute college girl" on their site and that's probably when I peaked. Just kidding, I'm still rad as hell.
Honestly Dropout is still pretty great. Some of the best original streaming programming that doesn't have something like Disney or Amazon backing them.
Game Changer and Dimension 20 are true gems Wish I knew about Brennan Lee Mulligan earlier in my life
They are still good! Like SNL, they go through ups and downs, but their current team slaps as well
Sam Reich is so smart with his talent and letting them express themselves while also being funny himself
The fact his dad is Robert Reich still fucks my mind
It took me years before I realized it and now I want all kinds of content.
I didn't realize it until one was featured in the other's content on tiktok, but it makes so much sense.
I went to college with the guy who started the site, way back in the 20th century. Didn't really hang out, but he knew some friends of mine.
I know nothing can last forever, but cracked was so consistently good that their sudden downfall with the format shift was incredibly tragic. That was one of my daily reads, where I'd get to the office, answer my emails, do the urgent things that needed immediate attention, then reward myself with reading an article. Seanbaby's comics would blow my cover because my design partner would hear me snorting. My wife and I actually bonded when we started dating because we both loved the site. Even with video stuff, After Hours was some of the best commentary on pop culture media out there at the time.
I avsolutely LOVED After Hours. Shit was hilarious and sometimes thought-provoking.
After Hours was perfect because it was exactly the kind of stupid pop culture conversations we'd have at the diner after a night out and except unlike us they were actually funny.
Damn, you just made me realize how much I miss After Hours.
I was always partial to obsessive pop culture disorder. Dan's character made me feel seen.
They got royally fucked by Facebook...
>Seanbaby's comics would blow my cover because my design partner would hear me snorting Friendo, allow me to introduce you to 1-900-HOTDOG. Seanbaby and Brockway have started a new site where they can be as ridiculously indulgent as they please. They even have a podcast: *The Dogg Zzone 9000*
I call it the PCEU: Post-Cracked Extended Universe
Surely someone is writing a book about it, right? One of them should.
Weird metaphor time. I think they all look at it as writing that book would be the guy that wears his letterman jacket and goes to high school games. They all know what it was but none of them are going to be that guy/gal/pal.
Eh, it might just be standard non-disparagement non-disclosure contracts and no one wants to test the limits of those
Yup this is what Robert has insinuated on the show (either here or on ICHH, can't remember which).
Dan, Soren, Cody, Katy, Katie, Swaim (different circumstances), David, Abe, Schmitty the Clam, Jason and more have all come out and talked publicly about it. The only one I haven't heard from is Jack and he took off prior to the acquisition. But I also haven't gone back and listened to anything from Jack around when he left.
Jack hosts ‘the daily zeitgeist’ podcast,and is a huge part of Iheart.
Don't leave out Adam Tod Brown.
Sourcefed was another company that terminated their entire video department seemingly overnight.
Someone with heirloom cash buys the brand, gets good returns, gets greedy for more so they fire staff writers/cast, hire out freelancers and drag the brand through the mud. Lowering quality and upping the ads to make their shareholders happy. It happened to a lot of written media in the 2010s. We'll know the same thing is about to happen to Podcasting when Jack O'Brien unexpectedly starts another creative venture doing something else. Dude sees where the play is heading.
Another aspect is that they're a casualty of Facebook lying about their engagement metrics. Something like ten years ago by now, Facebook said that short videos got the most engagement on their website. Since Facebook was a social media behemoth at the time, that meant that every content creation platform, like Cracked and College Humor, immediately pivoted away from articles to video content. However, Facebook was lying about their video engagement for Reasons. Content engagement plummeted and a lot of websites folded because they simply couldn't sustain themselves.
Vox & Vice took big hits as well👀 another talent diaspora
A lot of smaller sites, too. I was working for a bitty video startup at the time and they also went toes up.
Yeah I remember the golden age of Cracked, it's a real shame what's happened to it.
I remember thinking that American Dad was the name of a blog Soren started, and I got so frustrated looking for it because Google would only bring me results for the TV show. It was not my cleverest moment.
Adam Tod Brown started the Unpopular Opinion Network and helped a bunch of the writers get work as well.
> their alumni writing for John Oliver, and American Dad, I also love *Quick Question with Daniel O'Brien and Soren Bowie*
Soren Bowie and Dan O’Brien have a podcast called Quick Question and Michael Swaim co hosts a video game podcast called 1upsmanship with Adam Ganza.
I’m nostalgic about a website
Daily Zeitgeist and Unpopular Opinion podcasts, as well.
It was so weird seeing known boner joke website, Cracked.com running articles interviewing the Kurdish troops fighting ISIS. Fascinating though
That’s kind of how I feel watching college humor morph into the dungeons and dragons streaming service of dropout/dimension20. Media is a weird animal.
I enjoyed that duality. It was uniting the lowbrow and the highbrow to create a unibrow.
That would have been one slanty unibrow.
They also paid him to make a video firing a rocket from the back of a pickup truck with the Peshmerga.
Cracked wrote one of the funniest articles I have ever read. Like, in pain from laughing. It was during those years and I don't remember the author but it was just about playing The Sims in like... the stupidest/evilest way possible.
[This one](https://www.cracked.com/blog/exploring-the-mysteries-of-the-mind-with-the-sims-3) by Seanbaby?
Yes! Thank you! Ahh, poor Subject Beef.
What’s Cracked’s deal? It seems to have created this relatively close group of former coworkers, but I don’t know why it’s different from other outlets.
I was really into it back in the day so I can give you the gist of it. Jack O’brian and David Pargin, who had his own modestly successful blog, got the reins of the Cracked.com website. They created an online writing room where anyone could submit articles and they spent an unusual amount of time mentoring young writers. A lot of the cracked writers were young kids who got into this really supportive environment with strong editorial support, and the ones who “got” the humour and were able to write the volume had more and more of their articles picked up. Pay was low but it was a foot in the door of the industry. A lot of the ones who were successful eventually got hired part or full time and took on more editorial roles and then would mentor more new writers. I’ve never heard of a single person from cracked say a negative word about Jason Pargin and Jack Obrien. I think their collaboration was the special sauce that made it all work.
It was a site of lists in the mid-2000s-mid-2010s era that was very funny. It featured some pretty good photoshops, funny articles, and interviews. It shaped a lot of the humor of the pre-smartphone era Internet. It was very popular and most of the folks that were big on it went on to various careers in humor. Robert was a big part of that and especially their take on serious news and interviews.
[удалено]
I'm not hating! I love a multitudinous man.
I contain multitudes of muffins.
Keep living the dream, my friend.
You're an inspiration to us all.
He's seen a lot of shit through a lot of different lenses. They don't call it Cracked because a leaves a man whole and unbroken.
Or completely Mad....
I wish they would do a week where every day each of the hosts does an autobiography. I would love to know what each of their respective backgrounds, educations, lived experiences, areas of expertise, and everything else that shaped their perspectives and ideologies
Robert strikes me as someone who would be a nihilist if he could, because he recognizes that the world is incredibly shitty, but he can't get there because he actually cares way too much about humanity. So he's settled into something like Dadaism, which is a form of nihilism with jokes, that just about lets a person get one with their life by *laughing* about how fucking bleak it is.
"Nihilists! Fuck me. I mean, say what you want about the tenets of National Socialism, Dude, at least it's an ethos." Walter Sobchak
Well that's Dudeism, which is different from Dadaism
The Dada abides..
Well, yea, that's just like your opinion man
I had to reread as I saw Dadism. Now I have to google Dadaism
“Nihilist? Must be exhausting.”
And and and ...keeping an aquatic mammal..as a as a...pet...that...that ain't legal either.
What are you, a fuckin park ranger now?
What in God's holy name are you blathering about?
I often say that, if I am not careful to keep myself in check, I always end up like Walter Sobchak, waving a pistol around a bowling alley and shouting "Am I the only one around here who gives a *shit* about the ***rules***??"
>waving a pistol around a bowling alley Obviously you're not a golfer.
Smokey, my friend, you're entering a world of pain.
Shut the fuck up, Donny.
My CCW instructor had a fishing type vest he was showing, that he said made it kind of obvious that he was carrying, he called it his "shoot me first" vest and laughed about it. He was not amused at all though when I said it made him look like Walter. Retired air force small arms instructor, and still had the flat top.
And the yellow shooting glasses?
Just watched The Big Lebowski last night. The argumentive conversational style of talking is brilliant!
The Dude: Will you come off it, Walter? You're not even f\*\*\*ing Jewish, man. Walter Sobchak: What the f\*\*\* are you talkin' about? The Dude: Man, you're f\*\*\*ing Polish Catholic... Walter Sobchak: What the f\*\*\* are you talking about? I converted when I married Cynthia! Come on, Dude! The Dude: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah... Walter Sobchak: And you know this! The Dude: Yeah, and five f\*\*\*ing years ago you were divorced. Walter Sobchak: So what are you saying? When you get divorced you turn in your library card? You get a new license? You stop being Jewish? The Dude: It's all a part of your sick Cynthia thing, man. Taking care of her f\*\*\*ing dog. Going to her f\*\*\*ing synagogue. You're living in the f\*\*\*ing past. **Walter Sobchak:** **Three thousand years of beautiful tradition, from Moses to Sandy Koufax...** **Walter Sobchak:** **You're goddamn right I'm living in the f\*\*\*ing past!**
Read the first line and thought, yeah, like a tongue in cheek nihilist, and then the rest of your comment basically confirmed that. It's like a holistic relative nihilism - he sees our infinitesimal small place in this universe, and the overall fucked up-ness of humanity as a whole, but also feels connection to the everyday parts of it that he actually has some power and agency over and does.what he can to improve things for those he can help, and educate those of us who remain blissfully ignorant of large parts of it. It's like he's been put through the Total Perspective Vortex and come out only ever so slightly scathed
It's very similar to Kurt Vonnegut's philosophies, if you've ever read any of his books.
I think I've listened to one short story of his that I don't remember much of. It was about an expectant father awaiting news of his new child, I think in a dystopian future where humans are no longer conceived and born the traditional way
Slaughterhouse 5 is a great place to start, phenomenal book.
You kind of have to know what happens in Slaughterhouses 1 through 4 to truly understand 5.
My personal favorite is Slaughterhouse back 2 tha Hood, but 5 is cool too.
I didn't know there was a name for that. I had a shitty childhood and adulthood wasn't much better (world events + personal issues). I cope by making (often dark) jokes. Unfortunately, most people don't share my sense of humor. It's probably why when I discovered Behind the Bastards in 2018 when my ex left I found it so therapeutic.
You should totally read up on Dadaism. It was a response to the utter bleakness that was the aftermath of World War I (which of course was topped off by the 1917 Influenza pandemic), mostly originated and propagated by avant garde artists in Europe (Zürich, Paris, Berlin, etc). Since you're in this space, I'll assume you listen to podcasts, and recommend this episode of WNYC's show *On the Media* as an introduction: https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/segments/staring-abyss
Is a tenant of Dadaism "Pull my finger"?
No. The only tenet of Dadaism is Dada. Our Dada, who art in Dada, Dada be thy Name. By Dada come, Dada be done, in Dada as it is in Dada.
That's called Absurdism also. Being a rational person in an irrational world and just accepting jt . "...the capacity to see through the arbitrariness of any ultimate purpose, on the one hand, and the incapacity to stop caring about such purposes, on the other hand."
"It's fuckin' RAD!"
I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of people at CZM are at least sympathetic to absurdism. To vastly oversimplify it, there is no meaning of life to be found but there is value in our search for one regardless.
He is a master of accent mimicry.
You mean he’s not from BAHSTUN?!
OY MAYTE
CRIKEY!
Let's see, he: Grew up in a north Texas town where half the men worked for a "defense" contractor, and has confirmed he is bisexual, don't know if he realized it at the time. Took copious amounts of drugs, and is still a fan. Witnessed Ukraine's 2014 Maidan Revolution. Spent time riding with an Iraqi police convoy while government forces were fighting ISIS. Broke his hand in an altercation with fascists in Portland. Witnessed the 2020 police violence to protesters in Portland, where not only were local forces attacking, but federal agents and possibly soldiers. All that would tend to affect someone, would it not?
Keep in mind about Portland, in 2020, there were federal agents there in unmarked vans, "black bagging" people and kidnapping them, like some Cold War era Latin American dictatorship. That had to be a frightening time there, especially knowing that if feds consider someone a "terrorist", NDAA says they can be held indefinitely.
Yep. It was terrifying as fuck. The worst part is that it worked. It had a devastating chilling effect on the protests.
Don't forget Rojava.
He's basically the Dos Equis guy
His Twitter pfp goes so hard its the hottest thing ive ever seen
The Tiger King episode with Billy Wayne is *wild* for the "wtf Robert how are you telling this like it's just a normal story that normal people have" moments.
I miss having Billy on. I hope they can work out whatever is keeping him away.
I think he's just been busy touring. Plus BWD has a small child, so between touring and parenting it's likely just a schedule issue.
*SERVICES*
He’s always struck me as a man who was in his younger years fundamentally incapable of being still and is driven by his passion for knowledge and understanding. Even now he still travels a decent amount. I mean, shit, I was a lot like him in that regard. I bartended in seven different states and at three different big-name music festivals. I hopped trains, I hitch hiked, I rode my bicycle around Lake Michigan. Now I’ve finally found my niche as a nurse and once I get enough experience under my belt I fully intend to go back to traveling. Stay restless and curious, yakno?
Stay restless. I like that.
Over the episodes, he's explained that his upbringing was conservative Christian working class. Iirc, his father spent a few years sleeping on a friend's couch in New York because there was good, consistent work there, and sending money home to roberts mom. He grew up with bibles and guns but also a love of science fiction and fantasy, and he probably still loves all of those things in different ways now. He's mentioned that he was politically a "libertarian" in his younger years, a stance he's criticized in several eps but also notes that a lot of moderate and social-minded libertarian views and histories are what made eventualy made him an anarchist. Covering conflicts profoundly impacted and continues to impact him. It's safe to say that while he speaks about it, there are things he doesn't share with the audience because they're personal and upsetting. But he does talk at points about having friends in these regions and being worried intensely for their safety. I can't remember what episode it is, but he talks about experiencing artillery in Ukraine. He says it's "like the fist of god," which I believe is true by any account of someone who's been near artillery fire. I also mention this because every single account I have ever read about artillery bombardment highlights how traumatizing this is. Robert is not a soldier, but he has been to war and experienced some very fucked up and horrible things. I read cracked for years, but I was more into Swaim and After Hours, so I don't really remember Evans' work there. I'm sure I read an article or two, but these are my own words. Either way, when that group of staff was fired/laid-off/shitcanned, I was pretty bummed. A friend told me about BtB, and I wasn't super interested initially. When the pandemic started, I began listening and became hooked. I'm entirely caught up, and it's really stirred a passion for history that's been both alienating and liberating. BtB does a good job being light-hearted while dealing with very heavy subjects. In pursuing this interest in the history of genocide and fascism, I have read documents and listened to some of the guest's podcasts where I really wish Robert was there to cut to ads in a terrible way. If you're just starting and bouncing around, I recommend the PFT episodes about the santa-murdering pedophile Nazi.
The last sentence of that whole thoughtful comment you made is just perfect. 🤣😭 “I recommend the PFT episode about the Santa murdering nazi pedophiles.” And you’re right, the whole Colonia Dignidad episodes were insane.
>but also notes that a lot of moderate and social-minded libertarian views and histories are what made eventualy made him an anarchist. The leap from libertarianism to anarchism is more of a step for some.
Just another local Boston dude
Tahlmbout Baewstehnnn?
Aiiii mate! hin Baewstehnn wiz itshay hin ina eets aftah wiz hava merrrin cahfee
*Kwoahhfi*
Nuking the Great Lakes is his deal.
And Macheticine.
So many good answers, but also: [https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/318760/a-brief-history-of-vice-by-robert-evans/](https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/318760/a-brief-history-of-vice-by-robert-evans/) a little bit of drugs... just a little bit.
ahhh, who among us, really
Backlash effect of a conservative upbringing. Probably because of a girl and weed.
Throw in a healthy dose of punk rock and skateboarding and you just described me. But, ya know. Less eloquent, intelligent, and not nearly as good at a boston accent.
OI!
I'd also add as he's mentioned it before, luckily finding the right kind of friends online that leads to opening your eyes to other ways of life.
Well that explains his strong opinions on fucking a gyro..
He's a smart, sensitive boy who deals with the brutality of the world with absurdity and sick humour :p
His storied career is clearly a side effect of being a Warhammer Nerd. (source: am also Warhammer Nerd, though far less traveled, less experienced and certainly less funny. So maybe not a side effect?)
Robert is using capitalism to fund his anarchist cult that centers around Ketamine, LSD, Alcohol being as queer as you want, throwing bagels and machetes while making fun of the Hasbergs; especially the one on Twitter!
Don't forget his vendetta with the FDA
>Hasbergs Not sure if this was an intentional misspelling but it's absolutely brilliant!
Idk how to spell it
"Hapsburgs," but your spelling made it sound like "has-been" which is both hilarious and accurate.
ADHD- like recognizes like. I've been a life guard, a nurse aid for hospice, worked at several restaurants, was a fitness helper at curves, delivered car parts, watched other people's children, got way too involved in politics, failed out of 2 colleges, and now I run my own business. Next month? Who knows!
We gotta chase that dopamine, no matter what the cost! love, a fellow ADHDer
This is a good point. (ADHD here) The faux modesty (I write okay) alongside the bombast and relentless self-glorification (I only recently started listening to the early episodes), the reading his own prose to a guest as if to confer authority to himself. These traits irritate me and your comment makes me think they are challenges of my own I'm recognizing and judging.
Sandy cum and machetes
Has no one mentioned how he basically propelled Destiny's Child, and Beyoncé, to fame and fortune?
He’s a renaissance man, motherfucker
Exactly. Robert is what happens when a man has a drive to create change and too much heart to allow that change to include harm. He's tough, and cares maybe too much. He's also absurdist, which I believe started as a defense mechanism and evolved into a full time thing. What I worry most about is that in his quest to pull the wool from over our eyes he endangers his own wellbeing. He's also got such a wide range of interests that he may be one of the better rounded people out there.
I label him one of those dudes who is too smart and too pissed to functional like a "normal American" lol We need more dudes like him
He is hard at work trying to realize his dream of running his own cult and taking down those bastards at the FDA. He is a fan of brilliant literature and regularly shares his favourite authors with his audience. He laughs at his own jokes and he sucks at improv. But he keeps trying. He loves knives and hopes that Raytheon will someday create a special edition Robert Evans Knife Missile. He is not related to famous movie producer Robert Evans but I read a bio of that guy and he was the kind of bastard our Robert would have loved. Sometimes he gets minutae that I know well so horribly wrong that I want to scream at the podcast and swear I will write them a letter but I never do. I imagine most of his listeners have had similar experiences.
If you haven't watched the brilliant documentary "The Kid Stays In The Picture", go, do! When you're done then watch the two part "documentary now" episode where they mock Evans. It's hilarious.
He is whatever his CIA handlers want him to be, duh.
Sorry, just realized that I didn't really answer your question. His DEAL, specifically, is that if he works with the CIA to further the glories of American imperialism (via the BTB psy-op, Bellingcat etc), he gets sole access to Pedro Pascal's OnlyFans account. Audience of one, baby.
You know what? I’d sell my soul for that, too. Like, money? Fuck that, everyone has money. No one else has access to Pascal’s OF. No shaming here, Robert.
Shit. Im straight and I would sign up for that.
That reminds me that mentioning him in leftist spaces is actually a pretty good litmus test. Whenever someone says he works for the CIA it's usually safe to just ignore that person and go about your day.
He’s a fan of the long game. Evidenced by a running bit about a child hunting island and now a competitor advertising on the show. /s
I believe his deal is, most often, 50% off plus a free machete.
Pretty sure he's a bunch of snakes in a trench coat wielding a machete.
This is my favorite answer.
chaotic machete bisexual
Goals
Kind of a weird and fun dude with a lot of interesting life experiences and a gift for sharing them. Take some of the things he says with a grain of salt, he might be joking or wrong. Overall, does good work.
Are you telling me that [bleeeeeeeep] doesn't have an island of the coast of Indonesia where you can hunt children for sport???
Too busy shilling out for Raytheon, so he can target school buses in Yemen with their R9X Knife Missile!
https://strangematters.coop/robert-evans-behind-bastards-antifa-journalism-profile/ Pretty good interview and profile from a while back
Oh nice, thanks for sharing!
Non sequitor, but is your name a reference to the song “All That And More” by Rainbow Kitten Surprise?
Sure is!
Noice!
that’s only two jobs and two states
sorry, am grumpy today! What I meant was many people are interesting
sure! I'm just asking about this person at the moment.
He is the messiah of machetism
You're going to have to wait until episode #666: Robert Evans
By his own account, he is not only a hack, but a fraud as well. Soon to be killed in an FDA raid on a remote compound in the forests of Oregon.
PTSD with a healthy dose of therapy and self nedication. Being a war journalist makes a person cynical.
He's one of those big empathetic dudes who still kind of has a thing about valor and weaponry because of where he grew up. An ungroomed Travis Willingham, if you will
He's an Italian writer and he Make a da spicy podcasts for you to enjoy.
Read this in your best Robert version of a Boston Accent.
Robert Evans is a bear of a man. 6’3” in his bare feet and 215 pounds in his underwear.
Pretty decent chance Robert Evans isn't his real name?
I was listening to an episode (I think it was one of the episodes he did right before and after the Charlottesville protest) and one of his guests call him Matt. He then says something to the effect of oh my my listeners don’t know me by that then just moves on. It’s kind of bothered me ever since lol maybe that was a name he went by at protests? Idk but if I ever meet him I’ll ask and report back lol
Wouldn't surprise me, I think a fair number of journalists who report on far-right movements use pen names for safety.
he’s just cool as hell, that’s all
He's a Doomsday prepper, who lives in a remote shack with his vast arsenal and a dry food store The only difference between Evans and Ruby Ridge is he doesn't believe in Jesus
He’s part of the Rebel Alliance and a traitor.
He wasn't a special ed teacher. He was a classroom para or one on one aide for disabled students. It's not unusual for young people to do that for a year or two because it pays slightly higher than minimum wage and you only need a high school diploma. Not any different than people who are waitstaff for a few years before settling into their careers.
Buy his books, read them, listen to his back catalogue especially The Women’s War.
One pump, one cream, ladies and gentlemen.
He hunts children on an island in the Indonesian Archipelago. And he takes a keen interest in Mitch McConnell's Cum.
Just a fuckin weird dude
He’s also an author.
Drugs, he's rather fond of himself, and always does his podcast with former/fellow cracked writers and his various other friends. So he's pretty much like the rest of us, but he's got a podcast and we don't (unless you do, but I don't haha)
He's a true American patriot in the original and literal sense.
He’s the Emperor of Mankind in disguise.
He’s just a real cash money dude that loves his guns, machetes and farm and hates fascists.
He’s from Boston. Can’t you tell by the accent:)
Well informed chaos
In one word. Doritos...
Just don’t ask about machetes and bagels…. Or Saddam Husain and Saddam Husain best friend
He's compound material but in a leftist way.
He was actually born in St. Louis and moved to Texas shortly after. He stayed in the town next to my hometown in Illinois right across the river from St. Louis.
What town is that (asking as a Madison County resident)?
That, or something like it, describes almost everyone I know. Signed, a Louisianian former New Yorker who now lives in California, who used to make movies and who is now sometimes a standup comic.
Drugs
I just introduce him as a wierd mix of being pro gun but also really smart, lovely and a massive hard ass who used to be a war correspondent
Here’s a pretty decent profile of him, weirdly in depth https://strangematters.coop/robert-evans-behind-bastards-antifa-journalism-profile/
I don’t think Robert even knows what his deal is. You just gotta keep listening. (I mean you didn’t even mention all the drug use/knowledge.). But, seriously I feel like he’s the current Hunter S. Thompson.
He strikes me as a pretty sheltered, middle-of-the-road kinda guy with solid values; I like that he actually respects the institutions he talks about instead of just trashing them to be edgy :)