Engage CA: Ben Shapiro’s Q&A Session

Ben Shapiro answers audience questions. Ben Shapiro is editor-in-chief of The Daily Wire and host of “The Ben Shapiro Show,” the top conservative podcast in the nation. Shapiro is the author of seven nonfiction books, including The New York Times bestseller Bullies: How the Left’s Culture of Fear and Intimidation Silences America (Simon & Schuster, 2012).

so i know you’re in favor of the

legalization of marijuana

based on like your past yeah

decriminalization yeah

but um what is your opinions on like any

regulations we should impose on it

so obviously i think you need age

regulations uh i think you have to

ensure that the weird thing about

decriminalization of marijuana is that

this free price is so cheap

that decriminalizing it to the point

where it’s still not beneficial to buy

it illegally is is a little bit

difficult

uh the reason i’m for decriminalization

of marijuana by the way is not because i

like marijuana i think people who smoke

it are losers

uh and

it smells terrible and you’re wasting

your brain cells the reason that the

reason that

i’m in favor of decriminalization is

because the government is terrible at

everything

and the and whatever levels of

criminalization have taken place have

done nothing to prevent

the access to marijuana for young people

they’ve just done nothing i mean

when i was in junior high in public

school walter reed middle school people

were selling it on the playground

uh so that’s not so it’s you know um

i i think that criminal treating it like

cigarettes is probably the best way to

do it

you know a heavy tax and uh and

decriminalization to the point where if

you’re above a certain age you can use

it like alcohol or cigarettes makes

the sense to me thank you all right

thank you next question

how do we stop the media with what

they’re doing dividing us they’re

dividing us greatly how could we

exchange something to make it different

what can we

do well i mean i think the first thing

you can do is stop watching cnn and

msnbc

i don’t i i figured i figured from your

question i was assuming that

um but i mean the the good news is that

i think that the

the age of a dominant left media is

basically over the fragmentation of the

media is is one of the reasons i’m

hopeful

the fragmentation of the media has taken

place like our website which didn’t

exist three years ago now gets 140

million pages a month

so this is so and we’re not unique in

that area like there are a lot of places

that are getting

more viewership also i think more

long-form engagement is happening too

and one of the problems that i have with

cable tv as in general is that you have

to make an argument in two minutes flat

or three minutes flat which encourages

you to make the broadest possible

version of the argument

and also to straw man the arguments uh

yeah we’re we’re all better off watching

you know hour-long exchanges than than

we are watching sort of the cable news

cycle

uh and right now it seems like the the

polarization that’s happening on cable

news

is largely driving a lot of the hatred

because the easiest way but the easiest

shortcut in politics to victory is to

attack the character the people you’re

talking about

and it’s something i’ve been trying to

work on myself because it’s so hard not

to just call people stupid

but it’s but but with that said

uh yeah there’s a there’s a jewish

principle called don the cuffs close

which is to suggest that

you have to assume the best of

intentions on the part of people uh

as general rule that doesn’t happen too

much uh in cable news but

i think the threat of the mainstream

media is waning i think president trump

has demonstrated that’s one thing

president trump has demonstrated full

scale

uh you know this is what i’ve always

said about president trump

is that president trump is a hammer in

search of a nail sometimes he gets a

nail

i mean sometimes it’s a nail sometimes

it’s a baby but when he hits it

but when he when he hits a nail it’s

deeply satisfying and when he and when

he’s hitting the media for being

dishonest it’s obvious that they are not

only being dishonest

in how they cover some stories but that

they are dishonest about their

central reason for being they say that

they’re there to objectively cover the

truth and they are not

which is why there’s a poll just last

week showing that well 58 percent of

americans didn’t trust president trump

to tell the truth

64 of americans thought that the media

were more polarizing than trump

which is an amazing statistic so yeah i

think the media are on their way out i

think they got a problem

hi ben i had a question regarding the

current state of the republican party

back in august matt walsh you know

contributor to you

wrote that the greatest betrayal of the

republican party was the fully funded

planned parenthood

and their obvious spending bill we have

a republican

house a senate and a president and he

still signed that bill yep and one of

their main pledges was that they were

going to defund planned parenthood

and now our party is complicit in

funding the largest

provider of abortions so i’d like to get

your comment on that yeah i mean i think

that the real question for president

trump was was he willing to actually

veto

because the fact is that this one came

down to the senate there’s such a slim

margin in the senate and you have people

like susan collins and lisa murkowski

obviously

uh who were going to vote against any

budget that withdrew supposedly

but in my view is it worth trying to

hold their feet to the fire you bet

there’s no there is no reason that the

house ever should have passed a bill

that included funding for planned

parenthood

and if the senate wished to pass its own

version of the bill then the house

simply should have said we refuse to

take it up

if we have to shut down the government

in order to defund planned parenthood

then shut down the government

uh over the last few years uh we’ve had

i think about what five million people i

think leave california

to go to places like oregon nevada uh

arizona including myself actually

uh do you think that the massive

migration of like middle class people

who moved out of the state do you think

that also had some

has something to do with a lot of the

policies that have been passed over the

last few of course

yeah there’s no question that’s the case

the people who are middle class upper

middle class

if you’re very wealthy in the state of

california it’s still possible to

survive in the state of california

particularly if you’re not really doing

it a lot through income right if you’re

doing it through a lot of passive income

then it’s possible to still live here

and it’s a beautiful place to live like

you’re not going to see people who are

exorbitantly wealthy

moving from malibu out to dallas it’s

human in dallas

but it’s

and if you’re very poor then there are a

lot of social benefits to stay in

california but we do have an

extraordinarily bifurcated state

the changing demographics of the state

of california do obviously have a

massive impact and i think that’s less

true in terms of racial demographics

than economic demographics i think that

bifurcation has created a bunch of very

wild left rich people and a bunch of

poor people who

are looking at the rich people and

saying okay give us a hand here and

that’s and that’s been

a serious problem for sure

hi um so i know the migrant caravan is a

really big issue right now and i just

wanted to know what how do you think

that the u.s should respond do you think

that it should be like how trump is

saying how we should

once they come we should greet them with

military or do you believe in a more

peaceful approach so first of all

so i will say and i don’t know you know

this is not popular necessarily in a lot

of conservative circles these days i

think the the

quote unquote threat of the migrant

caravan has been wildly exaggerated

what i mean by that is not that illegal

immigration is not a threat i spent half

the speech talking about illegal

immigration

what i mean is that there was a migrant

caravan last year by the time it reached

the border it was like 300 people

they went to a port of entry about 100

of them ended up being able to be

granted asylum and 200 of them were

deported

okay the idea that there are 10 000

people who are arriving armed with guns

and rocks and they’re just going to try

to break through the border i haven’t

seen the evidence of that

and if that evidence were to occur then

i think that

the kind of troop search that president

trump is talking about at the border

then you might think maybe that’s that’s

worthwhile right i mean this this troop

surge is legitimately the size of the

last troop surge in afghanistan

uh to meet what will probably be a

couple of thousand people who arrive at

points of entry

now i’ve been in favor of the wall i was

in favor of a physical

border a hardened barrier between the

united states and mexico before

president trump was i will when he no

longer is right i mean i think that

that that that is a necessity and the

same way that israel has a border

uh so it’s it makes perfect sense to me

to have that border but

this notion that is being played up that

this is a crisis

the migrant caravan itself is a crisis i

think that that’s being played up for

political purposes now what president

trump has done that smart

is he’s trolled the left into responding

in the stupidest possible way so what

the left has said

like really this is this is one of his

areas of genius president trump will say

something

i don’t think that it’s advertent i

don’t think he’s doing it on purpose but

he’s really good at it

he says something

he says something that there’s like a

center core of truth to it

but it’s wrapped up in this bundle of

manure and

what and and then the left responds to

the bundle of manure and in the process

they throw out the central truth so

trump says stuff like the migrant

caravan is a crisis

we have to send people to the border now

if people show up with rocks we should

shoot them

right i mean he says these sorts of

things and then the left goes

what this guy’s a racist he’s a ra and

everybody who agrees with him is a

racist and illegal immigration is not a

problem at all there is no problem with

illegal immigration why are we worried

about our southern border at all anybody

who is worried about our southern border

is a racist

so now if you’re a voter you have a

choice you can either go with the guy

who says illegal immigration is a crisis

or you can go with the people who say

that illegal immigration not only is not

a crisis it’s not a problem

at all and anybody who believes that it

is a problem is a racist

and so you end up with these two

positions that are both like if

democrats had a brain in their head what

they would say is

listen illegal immigration is a problem

here are some sane ways of handling

illegal immigration there’s no reason to

exaggerate

the problem of this migration we should

have people on the border to stop

it people should go to ports of entry we

have ways of handling this but

exaggerating it is obviously a ploy for

political purposes democrats won’t do

that because they hate trump so much

that anything he does

they just like themselves on fire so

it’s

hey hey ben uh big big fan i know you’re

for defunding planned parenthood

what part just the abortion part uh well

if you defend the abortion part then the

entire

organization collapsed well hold on wait

a minute wait wait wait wait hold on

what is the vast majority of money that

they make is based on performance

performances

so you’re against welfare uh against

wic against food stamps right we don’t

want to give any money to those people

right

well what i’m in favor of is local

societal help for folks who are in

trouble i don’t believe in

broad-based federal programs that create

bad incentive structures

okay so so let me let me let me say it

this way so somebody okay

last statement so somebody could go to

plan

i’d be for rather paying than for

food stamps or welfare or wic which i

don’t want to pay for anyways

okay uh you’re against my tax dollars

our tax dollars going for

free condoms and birth control to say

that anybody’s not going to have sex

until marriage that that’s an ignorant

statement people are going to have sex

regardless so

could you give them free birth control

and condoms and our tax dollars pay for

that

all right we’re going to okay so let’s

let’s answer that so

my my general rule is if you don’t want

me in your bedroom then let me stay out

of your bedroom

meaning that i’ve been told that it’s

none of my business what you do in your

bedroom and i’m totally cool with that i

don’t want to be in there man that’s

that’s wild

you know but but it’s

but that also means that i’m not going

to subsidize your sex life if you

and frankly i am bewildered i’m just

bewildered by the argument that it is

difficult to obtain birth control in

this country

that’s an insane contention it’s an

insane contention i mean have these

people been to a cvs

i i also will say just on a moral basis

on a moral basis i really don’t like the

argument ah people are gonna have sex

anyway yeah people are gonna do a lot of

stuff anyway doesn’t mean i have to

subsidize it like i was

you know as

as um as the man who was in all

likelihood the most prominent

and open virgin in america until

marriage uh like i

like really this is you know it’s it’s

not even a laugh line it was a point of

pride for me it’s a moral

because i believe that it i believe it’s

a moral thing like

because i believe that marriage was

designed to contain sex like this was

this is what marriage was designed to do

and separating marriage from sex has led

such significant ramifications for the

society in terms of single motherhood in

terms of the demeaning of women

in terms of the rise of pornography in

terms of the destruction of

relationships between men and women

it’s been absolutely terrible so i’m

so i don’t i was 24 when i was gone

when i got married which means i was a

virgin until i was 24. my wife was a

virgin until she got married

that is a good thing and the fact that

and just because popular culture has

decided to mock people who i think try

to make good moral decisions about their

sex life

popular culture is full of crap

oh hey what’s up ben my name is joel

piggybacking on that

mom and dad taught you that my wife and

i proud virgins

my brother and his wife proud virgins so

i’m good with that i’m proud of it

uh this question stems actually from a

debate we had last week with california

professional firefighters union

president

polls show that 70 percent of firemen

and policemen are conservative and

they’re republican

but yet we give our votes constantly to

the democratic party we throw our names

out for this crappy gas tax

for the you know the dialysis center

just a bunch of nonsense

that obviously unions have a bad look at

but

as a cow as a fireman as a policeman we

again have been giving our vote out what

can we do what can i do

to bridge that gap of those 70 percent

of conservatives

and win that vote how can we bridge the

gap with the republicans and go hey

i know there’s a bad rap with unions but

what can we do in order

to change that vote and change the

demographic i mean the

the fact is that i mean obviously you’re

right that the money that is being spent

by all of these

unions uh is going toward democrats

because there’s a corrupt bargain

between the unions and the legislators

in the state of california and the

corrupt bargain is that if we spend a

lot of money getting you guys elected

you will then sign pension rich

contracts

that do not pay out over time simply

because the money’s not there i mean

they’re lying

about listen here’s the reality they’re

lying to the police they’re lying to

firefighters when they say that this

money is in the pension funds they are

lying to you it is nonsense

they’re saying that stuff is accruing at

like eight percent a year okay if i

could get eight percent a year on my

money i’d put my money in there

like the calper and this is true for

virtually every public

union in in the state of california

which is why what you’re seeing in

cities like stockton is that the first

people who are getting nailed are the

police and the firefighters

right this is this is what’s happening

all over the state of california so

listen i’ve been long in favor of of

right to work states

i think that getting rid of a corrupt

system by which the state

takes wages out of the pockets of

professionals and then gives them to

unions to be spent on

the election of those legislators again

that is corrupt and terrible

and the only way that’s going to stop is

if people are able to actually

you know form voluntary associations

without the imprimatur of the state if

you want to negotiate with your boss

that’s fine but

if you want to negotiate with the state

of california on the basis of

legislation that is promulgated

that’s a that’s a real problem that’s a

real problem the unions are public

sector unions are a threat and i know

that

it’s become unpopular even in

conservative circles to talk about

public sector unions for cops and

firefighters because we love cops and

firefighters but the fact is that the

logic is no different than it is for any

other

public sector employee and if we’re not

willing to say that

then that’s what we’re gonna get we’re

gonna get a lot of money that is spent

by you know unions that don’t even

represent their own constituents

politically now there can be regulations

that are put in place

that prevent the the use of those monies

for politics themselves uh which would

be another way of doing this if you

don’t want to actually just get rid of

the unions then what you do is you say

they’re not allowed to spend this money

on politicking they can only spend this

money

on services for their own members

hi i just wanted to ask you if there was

ever a specific point in your life

where uh you just got really into

politics

and what should young people like me do

to start a career in politics

okay so

so i honestly can’t remember a time when

i wasn’t into politics i was always very

into history

the first chapter book i remember

reading was i think i was four and a

half and i was reading

like a chapter bio of benjamin franklin

so i was always into this stuff

um it’s uh yeah i i

like i found a paper that i wrote when i

was 12 about the impeachment of bill

clinton

at 12 even at 12 i was in favor by the

way um

but i i think that to

you know the way to get involved

professionally in politics there are a

couple of different

paths right if you want to be involved

in electoral politics then getting an

internship with a congress person

uh going to work for a think tank like

the heritage foundation is great

if you want to be sort of in the

commentary what i always say is that

you have to you have to have a

comparative advantage

where are you an expert that nobody else

is an expert pick a field get really

good at it and suddenly you’re offering

facts that nobody else has because

the truth is that uh you know in the in

the clean version

opinions are like armpits uh everyone

has them but that’s it but

uh but

but people start listening to your

opinion if you actually have facts at

your disposal that nobody else has

and so learning a lot reading

incessantly is the best way to get into

this and then when you get old enough

when you go to college

uh and you are at college what i’ve said

to every college student is if you

is what one of my mentors andrew

breitbart told me which is

if you have a cell phone you’re now a

reporter right you’re in a you’re in an

area where you can report on things that

are of relevance to a huge swath of the

public and you should be reporting on

that if you can get away with it

um but you know learning and reading

incessantly like i put on my podcast i

recommend basically a book a day or a

book every couple of days

uh and i am people kept asking me to

post a reading list i’m going to have to

but you should read economics in one

lesson by henry haslet to give yourself

a basic

understanding of economics basic

economics by thomas soules another one

you should read uh uh probably a people

a a history of the united states by paul

johnson

which is a really good thick history of

the united states

you should read the federalist papers

like there’s certain foundational

documents that are worth reading and

getting to know

hey bang big fan um first i want to

thank you for being you

um well you’re you’re awesome dude well

thank you

um i really have a choice in the matter

thank you

it’s a blessing um i’m i’m assuming that

you’ve read

tolstoy’s the kingdom of god is within

you i know actually

no oh jeez i don’t know sorry i didn’t i

didn’t mean to destroy yourself

a lot of other tolstoy but go ahead um

he posits um basically a radical

teaching of um

christ turned the other cheek which is

like no violence

in any way whatsoever and i was

she’s not enough this is no it’s fine i

i can get your premise that’s it yeah

um i was wondering if you agreed with

that and also how you would rectify that

with the second amendment

so this is one of the areas where i’m

real fortunate to be a jew um

[Applause]

so the reality is that you know my

understanding and

this is this is where i’ll actually ask

for a hand but

tell me if my if my understanding of

this is correct my understanding of turn

the other cheek is not that if somebody

is violent to you

that your job is to be pacifist in the

face of violence it’s that you’re

supposed to

is that in seoul you’re supposed to be

humble enough to understand a rebuke

the new testament and the old testament

support the second amendment

the turning wait wait the turning of the

other cheek was when you’re personally

insulted

versus attacked maligned somebody

breaking into your home

the bible says new testament says that

if you do not provide for your family

you are worse than an infidel and that

also means self-defense

so i have to say i’m really liking this

format i can like tag out for a

christian

that’s great it’s like macho man randy

savage coming in from the top rope right

there

generation z is probably more

conservative than baby boomers

how are we supposed to convince our

peers that a uh

a life full of responsibility and uh

judeo-christian values

is going to be more beneficial to our

souls in the long run than engaging in

immediate pleasures so i think that

that’s something we have to be

it’s a great question and this is the

only question that really matters right

um i think that

the the key is that kids have to be

taught from a very young age that

responsibility falls on them and that

that’s a good thing

you know it’s really interesting when

you bring up young kids right now i have

two kids so i can say this

kids like rules and they like

responsibility um

every kid when they’re when they’re

three four or five years old they want

to be an adult

right now that we’re adults this is one

of the big problems we have in our

country is that all the adults now want

to be kids but

all the but kids actually want

responsibility they want to be

given rules they want the idea that they

have been granted the capacity to shape

the world around them it’s empowering

to them kids want to be given the

feeling that their life is an adventure

when you you a kid like small

kids you them when you give them

everything you them when you

tell them

that everything is going to be provided

for them without work and

i think that the human soul resonates to

that i i said this the other day on

my podcast i was talking about the fact

that america is a significantly less

mobile society than we were 30 years ago

and i think it’s a serious problem i

think that it used to be

actually you’ll see a preview so

tomorrow um we air this

uh sunday special that i did with tucker

carlson uh

and and i like tucker but i have some

pretty significant disagreements with

tucker uh

and tucker is uh i will say that tucker

you know calls himself sort of a

populist on economics he’s a lot closer

to bernie sanders than he is to me on a

lot of these issues

uh and you’ll see like when you watch

the sunday special it’s pretty

fascinating he pretty much

and he he’ll admit this he’ll say this

uh and one of the things that he says

is he says you know why should it be

that people who are in towns where

they’re losing jobs you’re asking them

to leave

the the gravestone of their father and

their grandfather and move out to north

dakota

and get a fracking job and i said to him

right because god told abraham leave the

house of your fathers

and go to a land that i will show you

right all you are guaranteed in this

life is adventure

and that’s a wonderful thing to be

guaranteed right that’s what god

guaranteed you when you were born god

said to you

i’m going to put you in a place where

you don’t know what’s coming and you

don’t know what’s coming next and all

you have is the capacity to make choices

that make your life better

all you have is the ability to go out

and shape your future and that’s true

we we are when i say we are privileged i

don’t think we’re privileged because

we’re rich in the united states i mean

we are privileged because we have the

capacity to shape that adventure

we have the capacity to make those

choices in non-free societies you don’t

have any of those choices those choices

are not there

and when you say to a young person go

out and make your own choices

and that’s really when i say facts don’t

care about your feelings that’s really

what i mean because what i mean is that

reality exists you can either embrace it

and you can grapple with it

right you can be you can be jacob

wrestling with the angels meaning

wrestling with fate

you can be you can be jacob wrestling

with reality

and you can overcome right you can

that’s what you can do

and this is a common theme throughout

the bible it’s also a common theme

throughout the history of the

enlightenment western civilization

right the the the the verse in genesis

where god talks to cain

right he says you have an evil

inclination but you can overcome it

right team shall you can overcome it

right that’s a unique idea

and it’s an important idea and i think

that young people resonate to that

because young people do want to change

the world people who are 17 18 years old

don’t want to be told that their future

is going to be reliant

on a universal basic income where

they’re going to sit there and

somebody’s going to send them a check in

the mail and their entire life is going

to consist of them sitting in a darkened

room looking at a screen playing video

games what they actually want to be told

is they can change the world and one of

the dangers in a free society is that 17

18 years olds who are not

you know given a purpose when they think

about changing the world they think okay

bernie you know

single-payer healthcare get involved in

politics what usually what we should be

saying to them is no we mean when we say

change the world

is build something go out and build

something build a family build a

fundamental building block of our

civilization

that’s what’s going to make you happy

hi ben it is very nice to have you it is

my unenviable task to say we have time

for one more question

i uh go ahead it’s it’s okay

okay two more two more two more

questions

i’m so sorry i wish we had more time but

please go ahead we have time for two

more thank you for coming and my

question is

how should the republican party reach

out to uh

latino in hispanic borders considering

that a great majority of

us are actually uh conservatives

i’m one of the few latinas in my

community that are actually republican

and when i reach out to my community

i’m labeled a racist and a traitor so

how do you how how should the republican

party

reach out to a community that is

actually a very

big market for the ideology that the

republican party stands for

and um a follow-up question today

if it’s

[Applause]

yeah i’ll sign that for you um if the uh

as far as the first question

uh you know i spoke at the california

republican party convention in 2012

2011 2012 somewhere in there and one of

the things that i said

at the podium is that as many of us as

possible should work on learning spanish

this is not to say that folks who who

don’t speak spanish shouldn’t learn

english they obviously should

and so we can speak the same language

but the language of conservatism is not

relegated to english

the language of ideas spans all

languages so the first thing we can do

is actually communicate in a language

that folks

speak in so that would be helpful now

the second thing that we can do is as i

said before when we see racism when we

see things that are

that are racially tinged we should

forcibly call them out

and separate off from them and that’s

important to do because otherwise people

it lends credence to the lie that

democrats like to promulgate that folks

on the right are racist

uh the third thing that we have to do is

we actually have to talk about what are

the central priorities so i’ve seen some

conflicting polls about the hispanic

community that are kind of interesting

so more socially conservative but also

Engage CA: Ben Shapiro’s Q&A Session

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