Christiana Gave Birth (Again)!

Trevor, Christiana, and Josh cover some big news – Christiana just gave birth to her third child! It leads them to a discussion of how motherhood is framed by society, its impact on the family and the economy, and how to find and utilize community to help manage its trials and tribulations. But being who they are, the three friends also delve into the exporting of Trump’s politics into the world and whether corruption is desirable or even necessary for countries to succeed.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Trevor Noah?

  This segment is brought to you by Google Pixel. You know what's really frustrating? Knowing the exact information you need is somewhere on your phone, but still ending up wasting your time digging through five different apps just to actually find it. Thankfully, Google Pixel 11 is designed with Gemini intelligence, so it can proactively find the information I need right when I need it. Like my flight info on travel days or my calendar when Eugene texts me to hang out. Oh, sorry Eugene, I'm booked. Learn more about what Google Pixel 11 can do at googlestore.com. These AI features are available in select countries and languages for users 18 and over, and make sure to check responses.

• 0:45Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, booked forever, forever.

• 0:48Speaker 01

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• 1:07Speaker 02

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• 1:24Trevor Noah?

  This is What Now with Trevor Noah.

• 1:36Speaker 03

  I need to get into MMA. I need to, I want more hobbies.

• 1:40Trevor Noah?

  Is MMA a hobby?

• 1:41Speaker 03

  No, to what? Because I've been watching football. The premiership is depressing for a United fan.

• 1:45Trevor Noah?

  Well, the premiership is not depressing.

• 1:47Speaker 03

  For a United fan.

• 1:48Trevor Noah?

  There we go, say it with your chest. Say it with your chest.

• 1:53Speaker 03

  It's a hard time. I've been introducing, so I have all these Man U kits for the kids because one of my good friends sent them, Femi, and he's Nigerian. So he's like, there was a time when this meant excellence. And he's like, I feel ashamed that I'm sending you your kids this thing. That means they're losers.

• 2:11Speaker 04

  I mean, it's it's the same as when you get um the the outfit of a fighter. And they get popped for steroids that week and you're like, ah, I just, I already ordered the.

• 2:24Trevor Noah?

  Wait, wait, wait, fights has have kits?

• 2:27Speaker 04

  Uh, kind of. You can get, you can get like the uh, whatchamacallit, like the outfit that their team wears in the walkout.

• 2:34Trevor Noah?

  Okay.

• 2:35Speaker 04

  You can get the zip up and the pants and everything. And you can get, and then you can get their personal merch too.

• 2:41Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 2:41Speaker 04

  But because they can't have all independent like Puma, Nike, whatever.

• 2:45Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 2:45Speaker 04

  They can have the UFC official thing and then everything else is from their site. So then some people make like their own kit that you can buy.

• 2:53Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 2:53Speaker 04

  And you'll like buy, you'll buy the kit and then it'll be like, the fight is off due to a a high volume of HGH found in the system and now you're wearing the kit and you're like.

• 3:07Trevor Noah?

  I feel like, you know, I was thinking that, so um, I I'm a Liverpool fan and not just because it's going well now. We've had some tough times. That's why I feel for you.

• 3:16Speaker 03

  I mean, it was good under Klopp as well.

• 3:17Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, but I was around before that. I was around when we were still like scrounging around. Do you know what I mean? I I haven't been the longest Liverpool fan, but um, I've been a fan for long enough that I I don't remember like winning things.

• 3:28Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 3:28Trevor Noah?

  Do you know what I mean? I remember your your glory days. Even bef- yeah, like, well, not before Gerard, but I mean, like, because there was like the peak Gerard.

• 3:35Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 3:35Trevor Noah?

  Where he was crushing it and then he had the slip, which, you know, ended it for us very painfully. But um, yeah, but I was like around. You know what I was actually thinking, funny enough, is I was going like.

• 3:46Trevor Noah?

  I I I found myself thinking that sports in that way is in some ways like the perfect analogy for for nation states.

• 3:56Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 3:56Trevor Noah?

  You know?

• 3:57Speaker 04

  Mm hmm.

• 3:57Trevor Noah?

  Like, if you think about it, right now, America is the Man United of the world.

• 4:01Speaker 03

  Oh, God, that's that's hard to hear as a United.

• 4:04Trevor Noah?

  I didn't know what you were gonna take that. No, but it's true. It's true. It's true, think about it.

• 4:11Speaker 03

  I hope my dads are not listening.

• 4:13Trevor Noah?

  Think, think about this, think about this, right? Whether you like America or not, you have to admit, there was a point where America was champion of the world.

• 4:20Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:21Trevor Noah?

  Without like, no hesitate, you name it, you know, music, sport, culture, politics, diplomacy, the like, it was just like, America is the country of the world. No one doubted it.

• 4:33Speaker 03

  Mm hmm.

• 4:34Trevor Noah?

  You went anywhere in the world and you said, where do you wanna go? America! You know what I mean? Didn't matter what country you went to. America! That was like the thing. And then, I don't know, I don't know when I would say the first like little slip, maybe?

• 4:47Speaker 03

  When Obama left.

• 4:48Trevor Noah?

  No, no, I think it was, I think before then. I think like, I think, okay, for me personally, around like nine eleven.

• 4:53Speaker 04

  I was just about to say nine eleven.

• 4:55Trevor Noah?

  When Bush started bombing the world, was the first time where I noticed people go.

• 4:57Speaker 03

  You mean that? Yeah.

• 4:59Trevor Noah?

  That was, that was the first like, huh?

• 5:02Speaker 03

  Oh, I, I, I was thinking about when like, cause this is so dark, because I moved to America after Bush started bombing the world, right?

• 5:10Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 5:10Speaker 03

  So I'm saying as an outsider, when did you consider like, maybe I don't wanna live there anymore? Obama was, you're like, oh, I wanna move to a place where Obama can become president. Obama in this case is like Alex Ferguson.

• 5:22Trevor Noah?

  Yes, yes, yes, yeah.

• 5:24Speaker 03

  And then when Obama ends, and you know, if you follow the American story, you assumed it would be Hillary.

• 5:31Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 5:32Speaker 03

  And then Trump comes in, as an outsider, you're like, hmm, maybe I wanna reconsider.

• 5:37Trevor Noah?

  I don't know though.

• 5:38Speaker 03

  That's what I felt from, cause like, it's kinda dark, but like, the war in Iraq, European countries were involved in that. Like, a- as a Brit.

• 5:46Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, that's true, that's true.

• 5:48Speaker 03

  Thinking. But you, I think you could be right, Trevor. Maybe I was just very selfish and blinkered. I was like, this still, I still wanna go to a place where more criminals are presidents.

• 5:57Trevor Noah?

  Josh, what do you, what do you think?

• 5:58Speaker 04

  I'm not a well-traveled person.

• 6:00Trevor Noah?

  That's not true.

• 6:00Speaker 04

  No, no, at the time of nine eleven.

• 6:02Trevor Noah?

  Oh, okay, okay.

• 6:03Speaker 04

  At the time of nine eleven, I was eleven. I was not a well-traveled individual, you know what I mean?

• 6:09Trevor Noah?

  Most people would say, I was a child.

• 6:11Speaker 04

  Sure, sure.

• 6:12Trevor Noah?

  Josh judges himself as an eleven-year-old.

• 6:14Speaker 04

  But I was like, I was, like, when nine eleven happened, I remember being scared, and then when I started to un- Understand, when I was in college, so like, we're talking like twenty, uh, like, like in twenty twelve, I was like, like, I, I guess I only saw it through media. So i- in American media, you see other countries wishing they could come here, wishing that they could, or, or even saying American propaganda out loud in their home country of like, but we're not America, though, right?

• 6:41Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 6:42Speaker 04

  And then when I got older and I was in college and I would take in more media, that was when I was like, the perception is changing and I had friends who, who did travel, who told people they were Canadian. And like, when they went to certain places and I was like, oh, okay, like, cause that wouldn't have even occurred to me, cause I hadn't traveled much yet. And so I would say, though, to Christiana's point, when you really look at the, the worldview of, um, America after Obama entering Trump, Trump had this weird way of like, I, I don't know if I have the words for it exactly, but he had this weird way of like bringing things to fruition,

• 7:23Speaker 04

  but it was him that did it. So then he would be like, America's looking at us as a joke.

• 7:28Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 7:28Speaker 04

  But we became a joke.

• 7:29Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 7:30Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 7:30Speaker 04

  Do you have me?

• 7:31Trevor Noah?

  He was, he was a prophet who made his own prophecies come true, essentially. That's, that's what Trump does.

• 7:35Speaker 04

  Like, he literally, I don't know if you remember that clip, he's like, the American dream is dead.

• 7:43Speaker 04

  Sir, sir, what are you doing?

• 7:45Trevor Noah?

  But you know, you know what, you know what has been illuminating for me is how

• 7:51Trevor Noah?

  Trump has changed one thing, in my experience when I travel, he's changed one thing fundamentally about America, and that is, before Trump, most places in the world I went to saw America as America. They hated America or they liked America, but that's how they spoke about America. Now, Trump has sort of, has sort of exported American politics to the world. So I go to countries where some people like Trump. And then some people don't like Trump, but they don't, they no longer have like a singular view of America. Does that make sense?

• 8:22Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 8:23Trevor Noah?

  So even in South Africa, the other day, I was, I got pulled over by a policeman, very common there. This is like, it's not like in, in America where your life starts flashing before your eyes.

• 8:31Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 8:31Trevor Noah?

  Like in South Africa, you get pulled over almost just for like a conversation. Sometimes they just wanna look at your car, to be honest with you.

• 8:36Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 8:37Trevor Noah?

  You know, does this pull you over and be like, ah, brother, what, what is this? And you're like, oh, yeah, and you're like, ah, it's nice, it's nice, I like it, okay. So I got pulled over the other day and the cops, straight up, guy rolled down the window, he's like licensed. Then he sees me and then he's like, ah, Trevor, he's like, eh, my man, what are you doing here? I'm like, what do you mean, I'm, I'm home. He's like, aye, my man, you should be there in America. Elon Musk, what is he doing to us? Why is he doing these things to South Africans? No, Trevor, aye, aye, but Trump, but Trump. Guys, there was no time in my life. Where a South African man, in my, in my entire recollection. Was speaking about the individuals in American politics. You know what I mean?

• 9:20Trevor Noah?

  Even when Bush was like bombing the Middle East, we said, America.

• 9:25Speaker 03

  Oh, that's interesting.

• 9:27Trevor Noah?

  It, it wasn't, it wasn't like Bush, people were like, man, what America's doing, America's going up against the United Nations. America's ignoring this, America's waging a fake war, America. Now I find everywhere in the world, there's a break, there's Trump. And there's not Trump.

• 9:44Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 9:44Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 9:45Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 9:45Speaker 03

  I think Obama did that, but in a different way. Obama made America look so cool and like it could like remake itself in a certain way.

• 9:52Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 9:53Speaker 03

  Cause I remember there was like, years ago, when he was, the first time he ran, and they did like a poll in Europe. About if Obama ran versus, I think it was McCain or whoever was the first time. What would the voice, it was like ninety-five percent Obama. The rest of the world was a, a no-brainer, like this guy is great, his wife is beautiful.

• 10:12Trevor Noah?

  I love that Europe, like, who has never had like a black president.

• 10:16Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. They don't want their own one, they want the American one.

• 10:18Trevor Noah?

  They were like, yeah, yeah, well, of course it makes sense. It's time to have some change, you know? How can America not have, and then you're like, what about you guys? Oh, yeah, well, let's, let's calm down, yeah?

• 10:27Speaker 04

  Yeah, no, it feels like dating at high school where you're, where there's always that one person that's like, oh, you're so sweet. And you'll find someone, what about you? Oh!

• 10:40Speaker 04

  Uh, no, you'll find, I said someone, yes.

• 10:43Trevor Noah?

  I didn't mean it like that, Josh.

• 10:44Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 10:45Trevor Noah?

  Oh, no, I didn't, I didn't mean it like that.

• 10:46Speaker 04

  No, no, no.

• 10:47Speaker 03

  It's that, it's basically that.

• 10:49Speaker 04

  That's so funny, though.

• 10:50Speaker 03

  Feels like Obama did that and then Trump's done it the other way, but that's why I think they're twin flames. You know, I have this whole theory.

• 10:56Trevor Noah?

  Oh, you do?

• 10:57Speaker 03

  About in past, yeah, in a past life, they came together. There, there's something about them.

• 11:00Speaker 04

  Okay, you're talking about a different thing.

• 11:02Speaker 03

  No, but I think we're talking about the same thing, but I'm talking about the witchy version.

• 11:05Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 11:05Speaker 03

  And you're talking about the sensible version. Trump is America's id, but like, Obama is, Obama is who America likes to think they are. Cause it's like the performance of goodness.

• 11:16Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 11:17Speaker 03

  Cause I think Obama performs as a good person as well and

• 11:19Trevor Noah?

  Okay.

• 11:19Speaker 03

  He probably is a bit of an asshole. I would be too in private, but like he is like humble in public. And then Trump is the dark side. So they're like the darkness and the light. And you know, there's an overlap in their voters, right?

• 11:31Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 11:31Speaker 03

  The same people that voted for Obama.

• 11:32Speaker 04

  No, it's very true.

• 11:33Speaker 03

  Also voted for Trump in these swing states.

• 11:36Trevor Noah?

  Hmm.

• 11:36Speaker 03

  He's appealing to the same parts of themselves, but just the dark and the light.

• 11:40Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 11:41Speaker 03

  That's my, that's my.

• 11:42Trevor Noah?

  Maybe America should only just have two presidents then forever. And you're switching back, switch back and forth.

• 11:47Speaker 03

  That would make it simpler.

• 11:48Speaker 04

  It would make it simpler.

• 11:49Trevor Noah?

  No, basically, just ask America, just go like, guys, what are we feeling like? We're feeling dark times?

• 11:53Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 11:53Trevor Noah?

  Or we're feeling, what are we feeling like?

• 11:55Speaker 03

  Hopeful, hopeful.

• 11:55Trevor Noah?

  Are we feeling hopeful?

• 11:56Speaker 04

  No, that's very true.

• 11:57Trevor Noah?

  Hopeful president!

• 11:58Speaker 04

  Because I do, and people always take it the wrong way when I say it, but maybe y'all will at least get it. That Trump is white Obama. He's Obama for white people.

• 12:11Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 12:11Speaker 04

  Who hated the idea of Obama.

• 12:14Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 12:14Speaker 04

  Yeah. And it's like, that to me is why I think people keep underestimating him because I'm like, you guys aren't ready for like, okay, I, the, you, you may need to cut this whole thing, who knows? But I think that there's a, there is a, a thing that is baked into America's understanding of the experience of a black person. So whether it's true or not, or whether it applies to every person or not, there's a story that people are told about you before they meet you as like a black American. It's like your ancestors were slaves. You have to struggle, but you always make it through and like you had to. Avoid like crime and drugs and getting somebody pregnant just to be where I am right now is like a like a white person. So just to be my coworker, you had to overcome all this stuff.

• 12:59Speaker 04

  It's like every one of your stories is like an Oscar movie. That's why we keep giving you the Oscar every time it's sad, right? And now you're living in a world where those there's so many cracks in that thing. Not just because there are black people who are like, no, I grew up in the suburbs all my life and my dad's a doctor. But now you have white people who are who literally are that story. But no one tells it in that way. So so they're so they're like, they're like, OK, you know, my great great grandparents were these Irish immigrants. They got spit on when they came here and everything. And I have a lot of like uh uh drugs and crime where I'm from like. People always make it Appalachia, but it's like, guys, it's everywhere.

• 13:38Trevor Noah?

  It is everywhere.

• 13:39Speaker 04

  It's everywhere. And so it's like my family was on food stamps, my family, all the all the stuff like that as a white person, which is like never really talked about. And so then this person had to overcome a lot just to be next to this other white person, right?

• 13:51Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 13:52Speaker 04

  And and Trump speaks to that the way that that Obama spoke to black people who may or may have not been having that like stereotypical experience.

• 14:00Trevor Noah?

  Right.

• 14:01Speaker 04

  And that is so powerful. It it feels weird to tell white people that they don't understand white people. But white people who are like the living embodiment of everything we've been told black people go through. I understand better than like white people who have always had it, if that makes sense.

• 14:16Trevor Noah?

  It makes sense because I America more than most countries in the world has told people what their life should be and what it could be.

• 14:25Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 14:25Trevor Noah?

  Right? There's no other country that goes like the pursuit of happiness.

• 14:29Speaker 03

  Which is an insane like.

• 14:30Trevor Noah?

  It's a crazy.

• 14:31Speaker 03

  In most cultures, they don't even believe in happiness.

• 14:33Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 14:33Speaker 03

  Like if I told my dad I wanted to be like, I think I told my dad that once, or it was my mom, I said, I want to be happy. And my mom was like, is that it?

• 14:39Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 14:39Speaker 03

  It's like. Is that all you want for yourself?

• 14:42Trevor Noah?

  That is a wild concept. If you said that to your parent, most African people, you're like, I want to be happy, then they're like, happy, happy, go and study something.

• 14:49Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 14:49Trevor Noah?

  Are you going to be successful? You know what is happy? You leave me happy. Are you married? Do you have children? You know what I mean? Like, like, what is happy is a moment.

• 14:56Speaker 03

  My friend's sister said, was Jesus happy?

• 14:58Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 14:59Speaker 03

  But then like.

• 15:00Speaker 04

  That is one of the wildest things I've ever heard in my entire life. That wow.

• 15:06Speaker 03

  She was making a big life choice. She's like, I'm not happy. She's like, was Jesus happy?

• 15:09Trevor Noah?

  Yes, but but okay, but think of it this way, right? Most cultures in the world will believe that happiness is a state of mind and it's a moment. You're not, you are, you are happy. You're, you're not like permanently in a state of happiness.

• 15:24Speaker 03

  Yeah, and you shouldn't pursue it. It's like, it's like pursuing pleasure. It's kind of decadent, right?

• 15:29Trevor Noah?

  It is, right? But America is the only country that did that. And so in many ways, you have a country where they've told you what is supposed to happen to you, what you're supposed to experience. And so if you're not experiencing that, you're butting up against it. So it's like, it's, it's, it's the, you know, fourteen day money back guarantee. Think about how many people in America are going, but this is not what I was promised. And to your point, exactly what you're saying, Trump is going, you haven't gotten your, your delivery. You haven't gotten the service. You know what I mean? You're supposed to get this thing.

• 16:00Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 16:01Trevor Noah?

  But you haven't gotten it. And then those people are standing up. And then other white people are like, but why don't they just, why don't they just? And it's like, yeah, you say that. But these white people are going, why has it not happened for me?

• 16:14Speaker 03

  And Obama did the same thing.

• 16:15Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 16:16Speaker 03

  He said, America has failed on its promise, but yes, we can.

• 16:19Trevor Noah?

  Yes, we can.

• 16:19Speaker 03

  He was very, you know, it's the same. It's the dark or the light.

• 16:24Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 16:25Speaker 04

  But, yeah, but the people, whenever I say white Obama, everyone's mad. Everybody, everybody's like, what do you mean? What are you talking about? I'm like, yeah, but and then I explain the whole thing. They're like, no. And I'm like, I, I understand.

• 16:39Trevor Noah?

  No, because you lead, Josh, if you start with white Obama, I can see people immediately viscerally. It's, look, in the world of stand up.

• 16:46Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 16:46Trevor Noah?

  It's brilliant as a premise.

• 16:48Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 16:48Trevor Noah?

  As like a concept, but obviously, most of the time, a great premise in stand up is terrible for regular conversation.

• 16:54Speaker 04

  Yeah, no, that's fair.

• 16:55Trevor Noah?

  Because imagine if you came to somebody and you're like, yep, in many ways, he's like Muslim Jesus. People are like, I'm sorry, what did you say?

• 17:02Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 17:03Trevor Noah?

  You can't take someone who people love and revere. And then compare them immediately to somebody they hate and not expect them.

• 17:11Speaker 03

  To have a reaction.

• 17:11Trevor Noah?

  To be a little bit reactive.

• 17:13Speaker 04

  I guess I'm surprised how much everybody hates it in that I still have friends from Louisiana who voted for Trump and stuff like that. And then when I say he's white, I'm like, what?

• 17:24Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, but that's what I mean.

• 17:24Speaker 04

  And I'm like, I'm like, that's why I'm saying, I'm like, I could understand my liberal friends getting mad, but then everyone's mad.

• 17:30Trevor Noah?

  It's worse the other way around.

• 17:31Speaker 04

  Yeah, no, no, that's fair.

• 17:34Trevor Noah?

  You're gonna call this man white Obama?

• 17:35Speaker 04

  But can I tell you, he is doing everything, Trump is doing everything that they told us a black president would do.

• 17:42Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 17:43Speaker 04

  This man has his own coin two days before, and then fleecing everybody. And then it dips and he'll even mention it. They asked him in the press conference when he already is like, is, I won't say promising, but when he's, when he's already jump starting this like $500 billion project for all of these AI CEOs before DeepSeek comes out, and they're like, what about your coin? And he's like, I don't know, how much did it make? And then they, and then they tell me, it's like, oh, that's peanuts to these guys. I'm like, why you let this dude deflect in real time? That's, that's a pimp move to just be like, I don't know who stole from you while holding the bag. That's crazy.

• 18:24Trevor Noah?

  I have been, surprised might be the wrong word, but it's the only one I can think of right now. I've been surprised at how, just like, the lack of robustness in America's systems.

• 18:44Speaker 03

  Like the institutions.

• 18:45Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, you, you take for granted how much of America is run like the game of golf. It's just an agreement.

• 18:52Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 18:53Trevor Noah?

  You, you're gonna keep your score, right? You, you, you'll tell us where your ball landed, right? Yeah, of course, of course. Yeah. And you, you're not gonna move the ball when you get there, right? No, no, no, no, no. All right, and you, but you all, you keep your own score. Think about how crazy golf is as a game. Everyone is out there competing against each other. Everyone keeps their own score.

• 19:13Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 19:13Trevor Noah?

  You hit the ball, it goes somewhere, you then tell people where your ball was.

• 19:18Speaker 04

  Mm hmm.

• 19:19Trevor Noah?

  If you move it, nobody knows, which by the way, fun fact, Trump does all the time.

• 19:23Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 19:24Trevor Noah?

  In actual golf.

• 19:25Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 19:25Speaker 04

  Hundred percent.

• 19:26Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 19:27Speaker 04

  Hundred percent.

• 19:27Trevor Noah?

  You, you, you, you don't move the ball if you do, but all of this, and people keep their own scores and the game is basically run, there's all the rules. But a lot of the game is just a handshake.

• 19:36Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 19:36Trevor Noah?

  It's a gentleman's agreement.

• 19:38Speaker 04

  Mm hmm.

• 19:38Trevor Noah?

  And I, I, I've, I've been surprised to see how much of America is just a gentleman's agreement.

• 19:42Speaker 03

  Also, I, I mean, I'm saying this as a Brit, how much is just ultimately resolved in court? And then there's a different court.

• 19:49Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 19:49Speaker 03

  So then it goes to a, a court in like this district says.

• 19:52Trevor Noah?

  No, America just sues itself.

• 19:53Speaker 03

  Yeah, it just keeps su- and then it's always the judges who are like, no, yes or no.

• 19:58Trevor Noah?

  I'll take you to court.

• 19:59Speaker 03

  So Trump does a thing and then now I've realized, just wait to see what happens in court.

• 20:04Trevor Noah?

  You have to wait for the final court though.

• 20:05Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 20:05Trevor Noah?

  It's like, which court does it go to?

• 20:07Speaker 03

  And then it's frozen because of something that happens in court. So I'm like, I'm not saying not being a president is powerful because we've seen how much it can shape the world. But now I'm like, oh, everything happens in court in this country.

• 20:17Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 20:17Speaker 03

  It's like the judges.

• 20:18Speaker 04

  Yeah. I think also for your, for your analogy of like the gentleman's agreement thing, it's like, that's also how our corruption is supposed to work. So when you're playing golf and you're keeping your own score and you're not going to move the ball, everybody moves it a little bit. Trump moves it out of the water.

• 20:34Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, actually, no, you're wrong.

• 20:36Speaker 04

  We all watched it go in the water and then he dove it, oh, he didn't dive, but he got someone to dive in, hand him the ball and then he threw it in the green. And then he goes, that's where my ball was the whole time. And then because we don't really understand how to like combat that, we're like, I guess that's where his ball was the whole time. Maybe I'm crazy.

• 20:54Trevor Noah?

  That's a great addition to the analogy.

• 20:55Speaker 04

  I thought it went to the water. And so then because admittedly with Dems and, and Republicans, there's always been the understanding, the gentleman's agreement of like, I'm gonna move my ball a little bit. We'll both say I won't move my ball at all.

• 21:07Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 21:07Speaker 04

  But I'll move it a little bit.

• 21:08Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, I'm gonna move to the bank after I've been running banks. I'm gonna move to the defense contract after running. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But you're right, it's been, it has been subtle.

• 21:16Speaker 04

  Yeah, and it's like, that's what, that even, even like under people that we like, there was that level of corruption going on.

• 21:23Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 21:23Speaker 04

  But it felt like enough corruption to keep everything stable. So we're still playing golf.

• 21:27Trevor Noah?

  Well, you know, there is the theory, I, I, I forget the official like name for it or the title for it, but the, the, there's this theory that says that there's no society that functions without corruption. And corruption is a necessary part of society for it to succeed. It's counterintuitive.

• 21:43Speaker 03

  I love this because I love corruption.

• 21:45Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, but you're Nigerian. I mean, this is.

• 21:47Speaker 03

  He said it, not me.

• 21:49Trevor Noah?

  But you just said, I love that.

• 21:51Speaker 03

  It could have been my British side. The Brits love corruption too.

• 21:54Trevor Noah?

  Come on, let me say something. One thing I've learned about Nigerians is.

• 21:57Speaker 03

  It could be my British side speaking to them.

• 21:59Trevor Noah?

  Can I tell you what I've learned about Nigerians? Now you're gonna bring out your British side, please.

• 22:02Speaker 03

  Brits are incredibly corrupt.

• 22:04Trevor Noah?

  No, but no, but they don't love the corrupt. There's a difference.

• 22:06Speaker 03

  But we're embarrassed about it.

• 22:07Trevor Noah?

  That's what I mean. That's the difference. I think that's what it really is, is with Trump is like, it's the gentleman's agreement. Like, when he sat down with Zelensky, he broke the gentleman's agreement. I'm sure many presidents have cussed each other out over world issues. But the gentleman's agreement is that you don't do it in front of the press.

• 22:27Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 22:27Trevor Noah?

  Do you get what I'm saying? It's the same way adults, you know, like with kids, you'd be like, yo, we'll, we'll talk about this. Let's let the kids go away. We're gonna go to another room and we'll discuss. Because you don't want the kids to see this because there's a certain level of decorum.

• 22:42Speaker 03

  Yeah, he's got no decorum.

• 22:44Trevor Noah?

  That's what it is.

• 22:44Speaker 03

  He's not decent.

• 22:45Trevor Noah?

  What Trump did there is you don't, you don't do that amongst world leaders because it's not for the, like, it's not for us as the public in a weird way. Go into a room, fight about it, and then come out and shake hands and be like, yeah, you know, we had a good discussion and we're gonna figure this out and, you know.

• 23:00Speaker 03

  But I also feel like, forget world leaders. I would not invite someone to my house to cuss them out. Like, if I wanna cuss you out, you're not coming to my house. That was the thing that kind of blew my mind about the inter, like, forget.

• 23:13Trevor Noah?

  But he didn't think, he didn't think he was gonna cuss him out.

• 23:15Speaker 03

  Oh, he knew he was gonna cuss him out.

• 23:16Trevor Noah?

  No, he didn't.

• 23:16Speaker 03

  You don't think so?

• 23:17Trevor Noah?

  I don't think so.

• 23:18Speaker 03

  Well, he thought Zelensky would kind of bow.

• 23:20Trevor Noah?

  So here's how, here's how I play out the timeline. Trump goes, Zelensky's coming. Now, Trump, remember who Trump believes Trump is. Trump believes he's the greatest negotiator, the greatest dealmaker, the greatest businessman, the greatest peacemaker that has ever. Remember, this is the man who said on day one, he's like, on day one, I will reduce the price of eggs. I will bring them down, day one. Right, eggs have only gone up.

• 23:43Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 23:43Trevor Noah?

  Day one, Israel, Palestine, I'm gonna end it. We're tired of the war, we gotta end it. Well, it's not over. You get what I'm saying? He's the person who believes, he genuinely believes. I don't even think he's like lying about this. He thinks, I'm gonna go in. I'm just gonna tell them what it is and it's gonna be.

• 24:00Speaker 04

  Mm hmm.

• 24:00Trevor Noah?

  Same thing with tariffs. I'm gonna do the tariffs. Then the thing backfires, then he's like, okay, I'm undo the tariffs. Then I'm gonna do the tariffs again, then I'm gonna undo the tariffs. But he believes it. So he goes, you know what, I'll call Zelensky. He's like, I'm gonna call Zelensky and I'm gonna tell him this war needs to stop. And then Zelensky will stop the war. What happens? Zelensky shows up. Zelensky shows up in his outfit.

• 24:20Speaker 04

  Mm hmm.

• 24:20Trevor Noah?

  That's the first thing Trump is angry about, cuz he's like, why is this guy? Everyone shows up here in a suit and tie. What is this man doing?

• 24:28Speaker 04

  Mm hmm.

• 24:28Trevor Noah?

  Do you know what I mean?

• 24:29Speaker 04

  Mm hmm.

• 24:30Trevor Noah?

  And that was the first comment, if you remember.

• 24:31Speaker 04

  No, no, yeah.

• 24:32Trevor Noah?

  He points at him, he's like, oh, he got all dressed up. Oh, look at him, he's a. So that's the first thing, the first slide for Trump.

• 24:38Speaker 04

  Mm hmm.

• 24:39Trevor Noah?

  They go in, they having the conversation, they having, it's a normal press conference until the end. And that's the moment where Zelensky says a thing that Trump feels is something that goes against like him and is like a threat. You know what Zelensky like? You're going to feel the pressure, you're going to feel Russia's influence. You go, he's like, don't tell us what we're gonna feel. Don't you threaten me. And that's when it goes off the rails. But he, I don't think he brought the man in to cuss him out. I think he brought him in to solve it. And then this little man didn't come in scrounging in front of him.

• 25:09Speaker 03

  Yeah, no, I, I, I think some of the the reaction to it though is just like people are surprised to see someone cuss someone out in their house.

• 25:18Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, you, yes, yeah, now to your point.

• 25:20Speaker 03

  Forget them being.

• 25:21Trevor Noah?

  To your point?

• 25:21Speaker 03

  It's a group of men.

• 25:23Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 25:23Speaker 03

  Someone came to your house and you cussed them out.

• 25:25Trevor Noah?

  That's.

• 25:25Speaker 03

  That is like, just sort of purely human level. Yeah, decorum, and he's gone down.

• 25:29Speaker 04

  I'll pitch you both this. I think that none of this would have happened if Zelensky had shown up maybe two weeks to a month earlier. Because you gotta remember that Macron was just in there correcting that man in front of his face and touching his knee. And so it's like, if you all talk about as a man, I will curse somebody in my house before I let a man correct me and touch my knee while he does it. That's, oh, you must be out your mind. Correct me or touch my knee, but if you do both at the same time, we fighting. And so he already had to take the L on Macron, right? And so then he took the L Macron.

• 26:07Speaker 04

  And then, because, because to Trevor's point, that thing that, that Trump does, he got to do very well with the, I think it was the president of Egypt, right? When Egypt, uh, basically says, hey, when it comes to Gaza, we'll take the sick kids.

• 26:24Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 26:24Speaker 04

  Right? Which, for Trump, is not a contradiction, because he's like, oh, we're gonna send some of the people to Jordan, we're gonna send some people to Egypt. So then, sick kids are still people.

• 26:33Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 26:33Speaker 04

  So then Trump is like, I didn't even know that. See, isn't that, isn't that nice? That he's willing to take the, the sick kids and that, that's really great. And you can even see in the moment, it's like, maybe Trump is trying to continue to do the salesman thing, but maybe he's also like, it's working. Like, it's, it's working.

• 26:50Trevor Noah?

  No, he does think it's working.

• 26:51Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 26:51Speaker 04

  And so then when Zelensky, who's just making a pretty rational point, he's like, guys, y'all think Putin's gonna stop? Y'all think China's just like playing games in the background? Like, Zelensky's one of the only people, you can tell even from him not showing up in the suit and tie, that's like living in the real world. Do you know what I mean? I don't know if you've ever been to like, uh, like, and I'm, I'm not trying to put anyone on blast, but I don't know if you've ever been to the party of someone who is about to not have money, but like, they're still dressed and still putting out the hors d'oeuvres like they have money.

• 27:23Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 27:24Speaker 04

  But you know, that they almost don't have money. So then, you show up in your hoodie and they're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, and it's like, whoa, whoa, whoa.

• 27:34Speaker 04

  You about to live next to me.

• 27:35Trevor Noah?

  I love, I love the idea that Josh, you should know this, if you invite Josh to your house, how he's dressed is a precursor to your moments in life.

• 27:43Speaker 03

  How much money he thinks you have.

• 27:45Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, like, if Josh shows up in a hoodie to your party, you should go check your bank account, go check your investments, go check everything. We're gonna continue this conversation right after this short break. Some of the most interesting things you learn happen while you're doing something completely ordinary. Maybe you're cooking dinner while watching a history video. Maybe you're on a flight catching up on a long-form interview. Or maybe, you're trying to figure out how to fix something in your house, because apparently owning a screwdriver means you're an electrician now.

• 28:17Trevor Noah?

  But you see, that's one of the things I love about YouTube Premium. I travel a lot, so I download videos before a flight. That way, I'm not leaving my entertainment in the hands of airplane wifi. Yeah, I've made that mistake before. Think you're gonna watch something in 4K and suddenly everyone's face is pixels. But one of my favorite features is smart downloads. You see YouTube Premium can automatically download recommended videos for you based on what you already watch. So sometimes I'll get on a plane, I look at my phone, I'm like, ah, I didn't download anything. And it's like, no. YouTube already thought about this. They packed entertainment for me in my little lunchbox. And with background play, I can lock my phone, switch apps, and whatever I'm watching just keeps on going.

• 29:01Trevor Noah?

  So if you like YouTube, you will love YouTube Premium. Sign up now for your free trial at youtube.com/premium. Terms apply. Cancel anytime.

• 29:14Speaker 05

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• 29:44Speaker 01

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• 30:05Speaker 02

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• 30:21Trevor Noah?

  The most important news in the world right now, across every country, is that Christiana had another baby.

• 30:34Trevor Noah?

  Before we get into it, because I want to know all the details. And I have many questions for you, by the way, which I've been saving.

• 30:39Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 30:40Trevor Noah?

  Many questions.

• 30:41Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 30:42Trevor Noah?

  Do you know how many people will talk to me about the podcast? And the thing they'll say, they'll go like, Josh, oh Josh, oh he's very funny. Oh man, love this thing. Oh YouTube, oh Josh, you know what I mean? By the way, like, people think you're like different people. It's very strange for me, but people will tell me about you. But then tell me about you doing something else as a different person.

• 31:02Speaker 04

  Oh yeah.

• 31:02Speaker 03

  Josh has so many jokes.

• 31:04Trevor Noah?

  They don't know you're the same person. You've noticed that as well, right?

• 31:06Speaker 04

  I've got DMs, like angry DMs that are like, you stole the joke from the guy on What Now? Because I'll do the, I'll say the thing here. And then I'll say it on stage and they'll be like, I've heard that before. And you think you're slick.

• 31:25Trevor Noah?

  Yo, people say that to me. They'll go like, oh man, I love the, love the, oh man, by the way, there's this comedian you should have on your show. His name's Josh Johnson, he's, then I go, you just told me you like Josh on the podcast.

• 31:38Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 31:38Trevor Noah?

  And they go, yeah, yeah, yeah, but have you heard Josh Johnson?

• 31:40Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's nice that no matter what, they want to, to take up for me. Sometimes it's against me though.

• 31:47Trevor Noah?

  It is against you.

• 31:48Speaker 04

  Yeah, yes.

• 31:49Trevor Noah?

  You are the white Josh Johnson.

• 31:50Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 31:52Trevor Noah?

  That's what you are.

• 31:56Trevor Noah?

  But the other thing people say, they'll be like, oh, I love Josh. Then they'll be like, oh, Christiana is so funny, she's this, she's smart. But then they'll be like, is she always pregnant?

• 32:05Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 32:05Trevor Noah?

  How many children does Christiana have? Yo, everyone, men, women, old, young, people just be like.

• 32:13Speaker 04

  Oh my god.

• 32:15Trevor Noah?

  Like, there's a comedian in South Africa, his name is N'Dor. He was just chatting randomly and, and he's like, he's like, yeah Trevor. He's like, aye chap, that, he's like, that Christiana, she's always pregnant. How is she always pregnant?

• 32:30Trevor Noah?

  I was like, what is she always? I was like, actually, she is always pregnant.

• 32:34Speaker 03

  It's kind of crazy. Yeah.

• 32:35Trevor Noah?

  First of all, congratulations.

• 32:36Speaker 03

  Thank you.

• 32:36Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, you are now the mother of a, how old?

• 32:40Speaker 03

  She is eight weeks tomorrow.

• 32:42Trevor Noah?

  Eight weeks tomorrow.

• 32:43Speaker 03

  So she's brand new. She's still got that placenta perm.

• 32:46Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, look at that.

• 32:50Speaker 03

  You know how the hair comes out is not how it is like in every, so she's still got her placenta perm. I know, I am a mother of three kids, five and under. I've had, I've had more than three pregnancies. You guys know, like, my womb is a strange place. So I've had losses, done IVF, all of this stuff, and now it's landed me at three kids. Cora wasn't IVF, though.

• 33:11Trevor Noah?

  So wait, so are you, how many, what's the number you're going for?

• 33:15Speaker 03

  I'm stopping it. Can I tell you guys something?

• 33:17Trevor Noah?

  No, don't lie, don't lie.

• 33:19Speaker 03

  I hate it that he does this.

• 33:20Trevor Noah?

  Don't lie. Let me tell you why.

• 33:21Speaker 03

  My body, my choice, Trevor.

• 33:23Trevor Noah?

  Yes, yes, yes, but.

• 33:25Speaker 03

  He's gonna say, you say this all the time.

• 33:27Trevor Noah?

  Above all else.

• 33:28Speaker 03

  Every time you say it's your last baby.

• 33:29Trevor Noah?

  Above all else, to thine own self be true.

• 33:31Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 33:32Trevor Noah?

  That's a quote that I love to live by. I'm not saying this out of judgment. I'm asking if there is like an end goal. Because you are with children, the way dangerous leaders are with land and like territory. They'll be like, I'm done. Remember when Putin said Crimea? That's it. He said, that's it. He said, now that we have, you are, you're the Putin of children.

• 33:57Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 33:58Trevor Noah?

  Because every time I think you're done, there's another incursion, and then you're gonna tell me about why you had to. So you said after the first one, you were like, Trevor, I will, you're like, don't ever have kids, I'll never have kids.

• 34:08Speaker 03

  I did say that.

• 34:09Trevor Noah?

  Then the second one, then you're like, I don't know who tricked me into this. I can't believe I'm doing it again. I'll never, Trevor, I'm done. After this, I'm done, I'm done, I'm, we are now the third one.

• 34:18Speaker 03

  Okay, can I tell you the difference now?

• 34:19Trevor Noah?

  Okay, tell me.

• 34:20Speaker 03

  So unfortunately, I live in a very godless city, so it's a long time to get a vasectomy. In LA, I sent my husband, my husband, February 14th, he had an appointment for consultation for a vasectomy on.

• 34:32Trevor Noah?

  On Valentine's Day?

• 34:33Speaker 03

  Yes, I said, go.

• 34:34Trevor Noah?

  Okay.

• 34:35Speaker 03

  He got there and the guy says, there's a waiting list. But what happened? Happens every Friday, they open up the portal for cancellations. This is the vasectomy doctor in L A, by the way. Everyone goes to him because he he does the job, so.

• 34:47Trevor Noah?

  How hard is it to do a vasectomy? Forgive my ignorance.

• 34:50Speaker 03

  Oh, it's so easy.

• 34:50Speaker 04

  I thought it was quick.

• 34:51Speaker 03

  It's quick, but it's it's a godless city. People don't want kids, so there's so many men.

• 34:56Trevor Noah?

  So there's so many people in L A getting vasectomies.

• 34:58Speaker 03

  If you want it quicker, go to like Utah, like in Utah.

• 35:01Trevor Noah?

  Oh, and that person will be like, I've I've never done this before, but but let's see what happens.

• 35:05Speaker 04

  Here we go. It's just snip snap.

• 35:07Speaker 03

  So so this is, I don't even want to go on too many tangents, but.

• 35:11Trevor Noah?

  No, go on all the tangents, because I want to know all the details.

• 35:13Speaker 03

  Because I've got people telling me, why don't you get an I U D? Why don't you do that? I'm like, no, let him do something, because I've my body's been through hell.

• 35:19Trevor Noah?

  I don't I don't blame you.

• 35:21Speaker 03

  So my husband is getting a vasectomy.

• 35:22Trevor Noah?

  Mm hmm.

• 35:23Speaker 03

  And we have two embryos in boarding school, in case I ever.

• 35:28Trevor Noah?

  Want to get to five?

• 35:30Speaker 03

  I know they're just there. I don't know what to do with them. You see, this is I'm pro choice, but then I have all these woo woo things. I'm like, do I donate them to science? I I don't like embryo adoption.

• 35:38Trevor Noah?

  No, you see, this is slick.

• 35:40Speaker 03

  Wait, wait, wait, wait.

• 35:41Trevor Noah?

  She left herself a little out there.

• 35:42Speaker 03

  It's not the out, it's just like, I'm like, I can't keep having children when I have like these two, not souls, but things frozen in time. So they're there, I have to make a decision about what we do with them. They're in Texas.

• 35:55Trevor Noah?

  Mm hmm. You have children in Texas?

• 35:58Speaker 03

  Not children, please, before the Republicans here. They're not children, they're cells, me and my husband's cells.

• 36:05Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 36:06Speaker 03

  Day five embryos.

• 36:07Trevor Noah?

  Matter of time before, like, I you you you remember when we were on the road? I used to have this joke that I almost believe is going to become true. They're just going to keep moving it further and further back.

• 36:15Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 36:16Speaker 04

  Mm hmm.

• 36:16Trevor Noah?

  You know?

• 36:16Speaker 03

  That's why we want to take them out of Texas.

• 36:18Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, they go like, but they're going to keep moving it further and further back. You know, they go like, oh, no, the heartbeat or this or blip and this inception. And it's going to get to the point where they'll just be like, your sperm is a child. Look at how they swim.

• 36:28Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 36:29Trevor Noah?

  Look at how they swim.

• 36:30Speaker 03

  Yeah, I'm afraid it's going to get to that. So anyway.

• 36:32Trevor Noah?

  Okay.

• 36:33Speaker 03

  So even having Cora, the ethical, I was like, how can we do this when it was obviously she's not planned?

• 36:39Trevor Noah?

  Right.

• 36:39Speaker 03

  By the way, my thing about having three kids, I think it makes me look like I lack sexual discipline in this day and age.

• 36:44Trevor Noah?

  No, no, no, wait, wait, why, why, why would you need?

• 36:47Speaker 03

  Because who has three kids in this day and age?

• 36:48Trevor Noah?

  No, no, no, no, no, but why would you need sexual discipline? I whoever says that, bring them here, I'll fight them.

• 36:53Speaker 03

  No, people are very like, people, women with careers.

• 36:55Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 36:55Speaker 03

  Like ambitious women.

• 36:57Trevor Noah?

  Mm hmm.

• 36:57Speaker 03

  You either have no kids.

• 36:58Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 36:59Speaker 03

  Or you have maximum two.

• 37:01Trevor Noah?

  No kids or maximum two?

• 37:02Speaker 03

  This is what I've found, I've looked at it.

• 37:03Trevor Noah?

  And why do you think that is?

• 37:05Speaker 03

  Because no kids, you have freedom.

• 37:07Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 37:08Speaker 03

  Um, two kids, you have balance. And it's what you could, at, at, at three kids, we're like at capacity, like it's, it's chaos in my house. But like, imagine a woman shows up for a job interview. I'm just talking about like a woman that maybe doesn't have as much privilege. And she's like, I have three kids. The person on the other side is like, this bitch is gonna have another baby soon. I don't know if I can give her the job. I mean, that's how I would feel. That's how I would feel. But I'm, I'm, I'm saying that's a very raw. But then you'd have to inter, cause you're intellectually thinking.

• 37:36Trevor Noah?

  Can I, I'm glad you brought that up. Can I tell you something? This is something I feel like people don't speak enough about. Because we, you know, the problem with almost every single conversation people have, not just in America, but in most places. But I feel like America does it, you know, in the most extreme way. Is that you can't have a conversation about a thing because it's overlapped with so many other issues. That then people think you're talking about when you're not talking about it, right? I'm glad you brought that up because even with us doing this, you being pregnant is the worst thing for the podcast.

• 38:12Speaker 03

  When I told them, I worked, I walked in, obviously I was like, they were like, ah. Like, cause my belly was showing at that point, I was past 12 weeks. And then Derek, shout out to Derek, who works with Trevor, he was just sitting there, and so now they're doing the sums.

• 38:25Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, everyone has to do the math.

• 38:26Speaker 03

  And they were like, they were like, congratulations, oh yeah, we can make the podcast. What do you do? It was so funny, it was just a relief. And then they were like.

• 38:32Trevor Noah?

  No, but it, but it, but it makes, you get what I'm saying, like with Josh, I never, with you, I go, okay, when is Josh on the road? When is Josh touring? When is Josh, okay, cool, whatever. But.

• 38:40Speaker 03

  You're not worried about Josh getting pregnant?

• 38:41Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, but when, no, but I'm not even worried about, what I'm saying is you being pregnant is the worst thing for our work schedule, right? Because you have to go see the doctor. Anything can happen at any time during the pregnancy.

• 38:53Speaker 03

  And I had a high risk pregnancy.

• 38:55Trevor Noah?

  There you go. You've got a high risk pregnancy. So your body is this fragile thing that is doing this amazing thing that you have to watch out for on all these levels. So if Christiana's not well, I'm never gonna put a podcast over your pregnancy. You know what I mean? I'll never ever be like, but the podcast, and you know this from me, I'm the person who's like, yeah, cancel.

• 39:13Speaker 03

  And by the way, like, so I feel very fortunate that I do this, the work I do and where I am in my career that. I have like partners, like you guys were like, okay, how can we make this work?

• 39:24Trevor Noah?

  Right.

• 39:24Speaker 03

  That was like, okay, what are your dates? What do you wanna take time off? When are your appointments? You know, they're the kings and queens of, you don't, you seem tired, go, go sleep or whatever.

• 39:33Trevor Noah?

  Uh huh.

• 39:34Speaker 03

  But most women don't work in environments.

• 39:37Trevor Noah?

  But this is.

• 39:38Speaker 03

  That are like that.

• 39:38Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, but.

• 39:39Speaker 03

  It's like, you know, you're getting fired, you're getting demoted.

• 39:41Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 39:41Speaker 03

  Taking time off, you're coming back at a lower level. You're already like postpartum, it's, it's the worst thing you can do for your career, having a baby. That's the truth, but no one says that.

• 39:49Trevor Noah?

  That's what I mean. We don't talk about these things because people feel like you're conceding something that they don't wanna concede. Right? Having a child is terrible for your career. Having a child is also terrible for the work environment, like for the, the actual, for your company, your office, it's not great for them.

• 40:05Speaker 03

  It's bad for the dads too, by the way, cuz a dad is like, I wanna spend more time with my kids.

• 40:09Trevor Noah?

  Yes, it's, it's just bad, it's bad.

• 40:11Speaker 04

  A, a good dad.

• 40:12Speaker 03

  A good dad.

• 40:17Speaker 03

  A good dad.

• 40:18Speaker 04

  Can, can I tell you the, the, the men that you would not know had children?

• 40:25Speaker 04

  You'll be in a fantasy league with them and not know they have a child. You will know their number one seed and not know that they have a child.

• 40:36Speaker 03

  Okay, for a, someone who wants to be an active and present.

• 40:38Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 40:39Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 40:39Speaker 03

  Father, in the current like capitalist framework we have.

• 40:43Trevor Noah?

  Thank you.

• 40:43Speaker 03

  Where your work is on your phone, like your email, you can't escape it.

• 40:46Trevor Noah?

  Mm hmm.

• 40:47Speaker 03

  It's very tough after work, drink, socializing, now they're like return to the office, they don't want us to work from home, right? So you're away from your family all day. If you're a man that wants to see your kids and be present, it's, it's bad for you as well. But I think with, and it's an argument, a conversation me and Lewis have a lot. The woman, you take on the actual physical brunt of the pregnancy.

• 41:09Trevor Noah?

  Hmm.

• 41:09Speaker 03

  The emotional, physical labor, the hormones, it's, it's feeling like you're being invaded. I find pregnancy very disembodied, I'm not one of these women, I have the most beautiful time in my life, I was glowing, I feel like shit. Like I, I, I don't enjoy it, um, and I've had really. I've had rough pregnancies.

• 41:26Trevor Noah?

  Hmm.

• 41:26Speaker 03

  I've had, my last birth was my favorite birth. I felt really powerful. I knew what I wanted. Like, I felt very confident.

• 41:33Trevor Noah?

  That's amazing.

• 41:33Speaker 03

  Yeah, and it was just like, I'd done it a number of times before.

• 41:36Trevor Noah?

  Mm-hmm.

• 41:37Speaker 03

  To be like, listened to and postpartum was, I couldn't even really dwell on it because I had two, I have two other children.

• 41:44Trevor Noah?

  Mm-hmm.

• 41:45Speaker 03

  But for a lot of women, it's this earthquake and you're constantly feeling aftershocks. And whatever decision you make, right, whether you decide to stay at home with your children or also work as well, you don't have the support for the most part.

• 41:59Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 41:59Speaker 03

  I find my friends that stay at home moms, they live really isolating instances. And they do work that's not respected.

• 42:05Trevor Noah?

  So, I've been experiencing this through different lenses and in different ways. So, I've gotten to experience the professional side of it with you. You know, pregnancy and a woman having children in the work environment, which I've loved. Like, it's, it's, because anything that gives me insight, I, I love.

• 42:20Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 42:20Trevor Noah?

  You know what I mean? Like, if I was in that plane that flipped over.

• 42:24Speaker 03

  Hmm.

• 42:24Trevor Noah?

  I would love it because I'd be, I've always wanted to be in a plane that crashes, but I would like to experience it and then come out on the other side. Does that make sense? So, if I don't live, I have.

• 42:32Speaker 03

  It's concerning, but it makes sense.

• 42:34Trevor Noah?

  No, what I mean is like, I love things that give me insights.

• 42:37Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 42:37Trevor Noah?

  So, what is it like? Oh, I now know what it's like.

• 42:39Speaker 03

  You've seen it up close multiple times now.

• 42:41Trevor Noah?

  Yes, exactly, right? So, but then, uh, one of my best friends and his wife, they just had twins, right? Yeah, yeah, oof, indeed. And like, there, there've been some days where there's nobody to look after the twins. I don't know how many months old they are, but they're like tiny, they don't walk, they don't do anything, they're still in like that, you know what I mean?

• 42:59Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 43:00Trevor Noah?

  They're just, they're like, they're like lobby. They can hold, no, they can.

• 43:03Speaker 03

  I don't know how they are.

• 43:04Speaker 04

  They don't do anything.

• 43:04Trevor Noah?

  They can hold their necks up. They can, their, their necks are now, they're able to hold their necks up, okay?

• 43:09Speaker 03

  They're infants, definitely.

• 43:09Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, they're infants. And some days, it'll be like me and him looking after them, right? For hours on end, hours on end. And the, the other day, we were sitting together and we, we're just like. Rotating the babies and he like broke his back many years ago. And then now carrying the babies on the stroller and the back injury came back. So for like a week, he couldn't carry babies.

• 43:30Speaker 03

  Oh my god.

• 43:30Trevor Noah?

  So now I'm helping him with both of the babies and I'm running around. But there was a point where we were sitting together. And you know what this is like, you know, but the baby start like crying in a rotation.

• 43:41Speaker 03

  I call it witching hour.

• 43:42Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, so just as one baby starts crying, it cries, it cries, it cries, it cries, it cries. You finally figure out what it is. Maybe it wanted to be rocked, maybe it wanted to be fed, maybe it wanted to be burped. Maybe it just wanted to move. Sometimes they just wanna stand up. Sometimes babies just don't like you to sit down. This is what I've learned. Like babies are like, why are you sitting? Like babies should be bosses in every office in the world. They do not tolerate sedentary lifestyles. Babies are just like, why are you sitting? They're like, what do you mean? I'm chilling. The baby's like, nah, nah. Then you stand and then the baby's like, yeah, this is good. I like this. I like this. That's all the baby's doing. Yeah, yeah. You finally get the baby to chill or sleep. And then the other baby's like, alright, my turn. Let's see what we can do with this. So we're in this spiral. We're in this thing. We're in this, I'm rocking, singing, burping, bumping, jumping, doing everything with these babies.

• 44:27Trevor Noah?

  And I think like two hours in, I looked at him and I said, yo, how much longer do we have? And he said, what do you mean? We we the whole day? And then I looked at him and I said, how how do women, how do they exist? And what I mean by how like how do women exist is. I don't understand how we've created a system. Where we act like that is not happening to everyone.

• 44:53Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 44:53Trevor Noah?

  Most people, especially in America, cannot afford childcare.

• 44:56Speaker 03

  No.

• 44:57Trevor Noah?

  They don't have support. They don't have systems. They don't have, so they leaving their kids at home at a young age. If they get to that age where they can, or some people are like bringing the kid with them where they can and how they. But I don't understand how we're gonna live in a world where we, on the one hand, tell people, hey, the birth rate is dropping. We need to have more kids. Why aren't we having kids? Not sustainable. But then, on the other hand, not support the very same people who need to have the kids to sustain a population.

• 45:25Speaker 03

  And let's not even talk about, and I think this is around the Western world, the housing crisis is so expensive.

• 45:30Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, yeah, no, it's all of it.

• 45:32Speaker 03

  Schools aren't good, private, but private schools are super expensive. So it's just like, everything is working against you. And then I'd say like, on a really, maybe it's, I don't think it's vain. For a long time, you don't feel like yourself in your body. You have this baby, you're lumpy, you're soft, you don't feel sexy. Do you know what I mean? It's like you're scrolling Instagram, you're like, you know, Ozempic, everyone's very hot and thin right now. And you're just like, I feel like blah.

• 45:54Trevor Noah?

  Can I tell you, just as an aside, two things. One, I still think GLP one slash slash that whole world is unlocking something deep in humanity that we haven't even like, we haven't tapped into. I think it's unhacking a lot of the hacking that has happened to us, right?

• 46:12Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 46:13Trevor Noah?

  And if you're listening to this, I'm not saying like, go and take Ozempic or one of these things. But I genuinely believe that almost everyone in society in some way should be on it. Because I feel like, in the same way that microplastics are everywhere now. I think we've all been like poisoned by foods that have hacked our systems. And I think these drugs are the first things that are undoing a lot of that hacking.

• 46:35Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 46:36Trevor Noah?

  I don't know how long, like how long, you know, it'll last and how people will feel good. I'm not endorsing it in any way, but I just think GLP one in particular. But have you seen, um, have you seen how now, like, big food companies, you know, for lack of a better term? Fast food companies and then chips and snacks and all of that. Have you seen that they're working on GLP one blockers in their food?

• 47:00Speaker 03

  So they will basically become Ozempic resistant.

• 47:03Trevor Noah?

  They are trying to make food now.

• 47:05Speaker 03

  That's scary.

• 47:05Trevor Noah?

  That can resist Ozempic and Monjaro and all of these drugs. Because the people who take this aren't eating junk food and aren't becoming overweight and aren't getting sick and are becoming more fertile. And are becoming like, they gamble less, they buy less, they smoke less, they drink less, they shop less, they, they do everything less of the unhealthy.

• 47:27Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 47:27Trevor Noah?

  And because of that, they're actually gonna make. Food that is gonna block the block so that they can get you back into that. Sorry, that's just just that's like.

• 47:35Speaker 04

  I wonder what that's gonna do to people who really weren't in this at all. Like if you like. If you just like regular Doritos, you aren't going anywhere near Ozempic. Are you gonna be like, look, I'll do anything.

• 47:50Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, you might be.

• 47:50Speaker 04

  Like, are you gonna lose your mind?

• 47:52Trevor Noah?

  You might be crack hungry, actually. No, you actually might be crack hungry, because because GLP one is produced naturally, as I understand it. Right? So it's something that your gut is supposed to produce when you are full.

• 48:06Trevor Noah?

  Most food hacks that feeling. But if you if you have a healthy gut, your stomach tells you, okay, you're full. So now to your point, if it blocks that, yeah, we might get like cracked Doritos now.

• 48:15Speaker 04

  Yeah, this is what makes me feel crazy sometimes.

• 48:17Trevor Noah?

  You brought children to this world?

• 48:19Speaker 03

  Well, I think, well, the worst thing is being like postpartum in the age of Ozempic. Because like, I think I've been through like the entire life cycle. So when I had OB in twenty twenty, then it was COVID. But it was a wave of body positivity. And everyone was saying, you're not your body. Thank your body for just keeping you alive. Because, you know, the stakes were different. It was like viruses. So you were just like, oh, I've got this thing that keeps me alive. Good for you. It didn't matter how it looked. And now the algorithm is just feeding me, oh, you're postpartum, how to get your body back. Basically, eating disorder content, like Lean is Law. It's like, and and every the timeline does look different because so many people on GLP ones. And you look at the red carpet from the Oscars or the Grammys and you're like, people are really different.

• 49:04Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 49:04Speaker 03

  And like.

• 49:05Trevor Noah?

  Everyone, everyone is on it.

• 49:06Speaker 03

  So there's also being a woman that's just had a baby in a very different cultural space where a maternal body is like. No, no one wants to see evidence that you've had babies. We hate those bodies. It's a mom bod. It's so rude, right?

• 49:20Trevor Noah?

  You know what's funny is that there's a dad bod, but we don't even have the baby.

• 49:25Trevor Noah?

  Trevor. It's true though, it's pretty funny.

• 49:30Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 49:31Trevor Noah?

  Like dads just get, you know what I mean? Men are really, we really have finessed the game in a good way. Cause like they'll go like, oh mum bod, yeah, you, she's had kids. Dad bod, you never had kids. You were just a dad. Physically had the children. Why are you using this as an excuse?

• 49:45Speaker 04

  I have not had to support someone all the way through a pregnancy. I've had friends who have been pregnant and I've had, you know, I mean, like, I've just never been in a relationship with someone who was pregnant and then seen the whole thing through. So I'm not acting like I.

• 49:57Trevor Noah?

  Wait, wait, wait, what, okay.

• 49:58Speaker 03

  He was very supportive, my, you were great when I was pregnant with OB.

• 50:02Trevor Noah?

  No, no, no.

• 50:02Speaker 03

  You bring me stuff.

• 50:03Trevor Noah?

  This is a thing I have.

• 50:04Speaker 04

  Do my best.

• 50:04Speaker 03

  You bring me snacks.

• 50:05Trevor Noah?

  This is a thing I have with Josh, just generally. I don't know if it's because you're southern or I don't know if it's because of just like your vibe. Sometimes you'll say a thing and I love this about you. But I think it leaves people thinking you said something you didn't say. Cause what you just said now, I think for some people, what they might have heard is, I have not stayed around for full pregnancy. I have never supported someone fully.

• 50:31Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, it's the way I worded it, but I just, I'm not trying to have any stolen valor of like, oh yeah, I helped this person all day through their pregnancy.

• 50:40Trevor Noah?

  I know you.

• 50:41Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 50:41Speaker 03

  This is like, this is over wokeness, you know?

• 50:43Trevor Noah?

  No, I know, no, no, no. I know Joe.

• 50:45Speaker 03

  By the way, I'm an ally for people who have been pregnant. However, I myself have been, but now you sound like a dead bit.

• 50:51Trevor Noah?

  The way you, the way you said it, it sounds like Josh was like, so, uh, I want you to know that I've never stayed around, uh, to see an entire pregnancy through. I've been there when they told me and I've been there, uh, when they were done. But, uh, I've never, no, Josh, I, you're, you're not saying.

• 51:10Speaker 04

  I've never got anyone pregnant.

• 51:12Trevor Noah?

  Cool.

• 51:12Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 51:12Speaker 04

  Yeah. And so I've, I can only imagine what it's like to actually be, you know, like, like Lewis or, or in, in that situation. But the closest thing I can, I can guess from the dudes I know who have, you know, had kids and everything, it's not just gaming the system in a way of like, there's very little that a dad has to do. There's also you wanna do something, there's nothing for you to do. So I, I equate it to like how it feels when you've hired movers. Because now you've hired the movers and they're in your house and they're doing all the work and you're like, oh, I could. And they're like, you would literally be in the way. If you help, if you help me right now and you hurt yourself, I, I can't help you. So like, just be over here.

• 51:56Speaker 04

  And so now you're standing in the corner while somebody moves all your stuff and you're like, but I, I think I could help. You can't, trust me. We work out all day and we move all day. We don't need you coming down the step, whoa, whoa. And then now all of a sudden your neck is broken and we don't get paid.

• 52:13Speaker 03

  I feel, I feel so bad. I'm such, I'm such a mean pregnant woman.

• 52:17Trevor Noah?

  That's not true.

• 52:18Speaker 03

  Not to you.

• 52:19Trevor Noah?

  Or maybe in the house.

• 52:20Speaker 03

  In the house, ah, Trevor, you'd be like, oh, bye. No, I think my character flaw is that when I'm frustrated with things, there's always like the target of my frustration, even if it's not that person themselves. So I think Louis had to absorb a lot of my, my complaints about, but also I have, I've had three kids for this man. So.

• 52:39Speaker 04

  I like, I like how, yeah.

• 52:40Trevor Noah?

  I like how quickly it went from, I was like, man, this poor guy's, yo, I had these kids for him.

• 52:45Speaker 04

  It is, it must be what.

• 52:46Speaker 03

  He's like your favorite, your favorite line. That's what he calls it.

• 52:49Speaker 04

  We must be seeing what Louis sees in the moment.

• 52:52Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 52:52Speaker 04

  Like a little bit of rationalizing, a little bit of like, no, you did this to me.

• 52:58Speaker 03

  But, you know, he's very active, supportive, and he's a great parent. Like, I'm always like, if any, I say to him, like, if you died and left me a widow, I'd go and get you back. Cause I can't do this without you. No, just don't die.

• 53:12Trevor Noah?

  But that's beautiful though.

• 53:13Speaker 03

  No, but like he's just.

• 53:13Speaker 04

  It's beautiful as a threat.

• 53:15Trevor Noah?

  I mean, but it's beautiful.

• 53:17Speaker 03

  Stay healthy, go to the doctors, but like.

• 53:19Trevor Noah?

  How big is your community? Like, how do you?

• 53:21Speaker 03

  Oh, my God.

• 53:21Trevor Noah?

  Is it just the two of you raising the kids for the most part? Cause your, cause your parents are in the UK.

• 53:25Speaker 03

  My parents are in the UK. His family's in New York.

• 53:28Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 53:28Speaker 03

  Um, we, we're very fortunate enough to have a nanny who focuses on two, Luna. Now we just use numbers for the children because we get their names wrong.

• 53:36Trevor Noah?

  Just do numbers. It's way easier.

• 53:38Speaker 03

  Focuses on two, um.

• 53:41Speaker 03

  Lewis currently does the heavy lifting with one.

• 53:43Trevor Noah?

  Okay.

• 53:43Speaker 03

  So he gets Obi dressed for school, gives him breakfast, takes him to school, takes him to any activity he needs to have. And then brings him back, et cetera, et cetera. And I focus on three.

• 53:52Trevor Noah?

  Okay.

• 53:53Speaker 03

  Um, but we have a like a great village, like my parents have come out to New York this week.

• 53:58Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 53:58Speaker 03

  To record these episodes. My parents came out from London. They're currently in the hotel like ten minutes away with Cora, um, three. Lewis's parents have already come out. They came out shortly after.

• 54:08Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 54:08Speaker 03

  Cora was born and they spent two weeks with us, helping us out. So even though we don't have our village always physically present, people are very supportive. And I think, you know, it's great to have like the physical support, but so much of parenting is just like the psychological toll. And you guys are part of the village, like friends, family, how are you doing, checking in. Three of my best friends from my childhood, well, we're schoolgirls together. We're in a group chat and we're always like encouraging each other.

• 54:37Trevor Noah?

  Do they also have kids?

• 54:38Speaker 03

  They also have kids.

• 54:39Trevor Noah?

  Okay.

• 54:39Speaker 03

  They also have kids. And we're all in different life phases with the kids and ages and and on and on. And even before they were like, how are you? How are you feeling? You've got your pump, like you're texting me.

• 54:47Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 54:48Speaker 03

  Or if I came in today. So we have a village. We are incredibly supported, but we still most days feel like we're treading water. So I cannot imagine how I think most parents in America or in the West are just drowning.

• 55:01Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, I it's I'm I'm glad you said in the West because that's something that I've I've found is the ultimate. Um, paradox of coming from a developed country versus a developing nation, you know? So first world, third world is the thing that you're sold in developed nations is that you have everything. Oh, it's great. The roads work and the schools are fantastic and there's healthcare and you know, this is a great country to be in. The one thing that nobody. It seems to tell you is that as a country becomes more and more developed. The one thing that gets eroded is community.

• 55:39Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 55:40Trevor Noah?

  The village disappears.

• 55:41Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 55:41Trevor Noah?

  And what you have to do is you have to buy the village back.

• 55:44Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 55:44Trevor Noah?

  You know.

• 55:45Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 55:45Speaker 03

  You have to buy the house.

• 55:46Trevor Noah?

  You literally, you have to buy somebody to look after your kid. You have to buy somebody to help you clean your house. You have to buy somebody to help you fix your.

• 55:54Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah.

• 55:55Trevor Noah?

  You have to buy somebody to cook, you have to buy. You're buying the same, the same village that they tricked you into not having. Like, I was, I was, I'm, I'm always amazed at the con of it all.

• 56:04Speaker 04

  Hmm.

• 56:06Trevor Noah?

  This machine, this larger thing, told everyone, you should get your own house and you should live by yourselves. How can you still live with your parents in the same house? This is ridiculous.

• 56:15Speaker 04

  Hmm.

• 56:16Trevor Noah?

  And so everyone goes off, they get their own house to live by themselves. They have a kid and now you need somebody to come and look after the kid, but they can't just come a few. If you, you know what, you should get a bigger house, they could live with you. You could have a live-in nanny.

• 56:29Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 56:29Trevor Noah?

  Where I'm from, they, they call that an aunt.

• 56:32Speaker 03

  Hmm, or a sister.

• 56:33Trevor Noah?

  They call that a grandmother.

• 56:34Speaker 03

  Grandma.

• 56:34Trevor Noah?

  They call it a sister.

• 56:35Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 56:35Trevor Noah?

  They call it a, and, and in the West, that's one of the biggest things I've realized. Every time people bring up statistics of how birth rates are declining in the West.

• 56:44Speaker 04

  Hmm.

• 56:45Trevor Noah?

  I'm, I'm amazed at how people never seem to want to talk about the fact that the West doesn't encourage people to have kids. And what I mean by encourage is not telling people to do it, but encouraging is facilitating, I think, in many ways.

• 56:59Speaker 04

  Yes, so I remember years ago when we had this conversation for the first time of like being careful not to let people convince you, you need to like buy the people you need and stuff like that. Because at the end of the day, this person you pay, this person you pay, this person you pay, none of them would like come and get you.

• 57:18Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 57:18Speaker 04

  Like, that's not who you call, you know what I mean? It's like, no, no, I just watch your kid. I'm not gonna come get you from a bar.

• 57:23Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 57:23Speaker 04

  Cause they're not your friends.

• 57:24Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, they're not.

• 57:25Speaker 04

  And, and so.

• 57:25Trevor Noah?

  They can become in some ways.

• 57:27Speaker 04

  They can become.

• 57:27Trevor Noah?

  Over time, but.

• 57:28Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 57:28Speaker 04

  Yes. And so, so then. Uh, there, there's like that specific aspect, which I've, I've tried to like apply to my life and I've tried to tell as many people as possible like, hey, hey, this could be a friend. Cause that's what we're doing with AI now. Like there's literally like AI friends in a way. I'm like, guys, come on, come on. Try, try it with a person. You know what I mean? It won't be perfect, but then the other thing that you both have sort of like helped me contextualize for the first time is that like, it's, uh, it's amazing that business is able to do the things that people think are impossible in their own life. So you, you're, you're Doritos, you're Lays, you're whatever. You see Ozempic. Everyone says that everybody's on it, but a lot of people can't even afford it.

• 58:13Speaker 04

  All, all people essentially. Yeah. And so it's like, this is just the first like two percent of what we're gonna see from these drugs. And already they're like, okay, then we need blockers. We need blockers so that by the time the, the pores can afford it, it won't even work, right? And that thing is like seeing a need and addressing it immediately. Whereas like with people, they're telling us you should have kids. There's a birth decline, everything. It's like, well then as a business, don't you think that it would benefit you? Yeah. As quickly as possible to institute some sort of like maternity, paternity leave, to, to like, to like have these systems set up in your business. So that way the next crop of people that you hire

• 58:52Speaker 04

  will be comfortable having a kid. And now you have more employees for the future, but everyone is like so compounded on and, and probably, and because we were made to be cogs, uh, not, not like people. Like if you, if you, you, you talk about the birth rate and only some people care about the birth rate. The rest of the people talking about the birth rate care about the supply. No, they do. They, they completely care about it that way. They go, the market is gonna collapse. That's what they mean by the birth rate. They're not saying it like people will disappear. They're saying, guys, we, if this-

• 59:24Speaker 03

  Happens at some point, the economy is gonna collapse. Be a new labor force. It is completely through the lens of labor. I think.

• 59:31Speaker 04

  And so that that just blows my mind that we're there.

• 59:33Speaker 03

  I mean, what they've seen, I think there was Japan a few years ago experienced the first year where they sold more adult diapers than diapers for babies. Oh. Cause of they had this huge geriatric population. Oh. But people aren't having kids, but to to both of your points, um, maybe because of the way I was raised and so my husband's Dominican. So very immigrant family, very family focused. Dominican. Dominican and I'm I'm Nigerian and you know, you know what that means. We live in L A. Which some people say is a vapid place or whatever, but there are good people there and we focus a lot on building our community like. Yeah. We take our friends' kids. Mm hmm.

• 1:00:13Speaker 03

  E- even when I was pregnant, I'll take a friend's kid and people take our kids. And one thing I will say in this postpartum period, it. Being spending time with other people and being active in our trying to build that community, it paid dividends in small ways. There was a mum. At O B school who sent me a text and she was like, I've dropped something at your door. Like it was just, it was like a very sweet. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Big up Lane. She dropped something at my door and I looked out, she brought me just some tea. I had another friend, my friend Chris. She was just like, I'm in the neighborhood and she bought food like that you can heat up and stuff like that. And then Cora's godparents, um, Dar and Emmy. They came by, just held the baby for a bit. So I think sometimes we complain about not having community.

• 1:00:55Speaker 03

  But are we trying to be good community and village members? And I think that we're in this like me, me, me selfish society. Whether it's about whether about your grind, your money, your holidays, whatever you're into. And we've actually forgot how to be village ma- members and we then we were shocked we don't have a village. So for the last couple of years. I I was a, I was doing that myself. So I was just like, how can I be better to the people around me or just show up in the small ways that I can? And this is why I think this third time around, being in a country that's not my own, I felt more settled, more supportive. More checked in because I was always, I've been more present for other people. And I think that that's a hard thing to say to mothers or parents that like,

• 1:01:38Speaker 03

  how many people are you there for? Because you're like, well, I'm drowning. But I think if you have that mentality of like, what's the little thing I can do for, you know, is there a parent in my um child's class that I can be like, oh, I'll drop them home sometimes. Or what's the little thing you can do? And that accumulates, and that's how you build a village.

• 1:01:59Trevor Noah?

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• 1:02:44Trevor Noah?

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• 1:04:20Trevor Noah?

  So there's a paradoxical idea that is very difficult for people to accept, but it is almost unanimously agreed on as being true. And that is that over time, load starts to like level off if it was a curve. You know what I mean? So if you're looking after a child, it's a lot of work. If you're looking after two children, it's more work, you know? Three children, it's work. It's weird, but at some point, the work doesn't actually increase, you know, at the same rate, you know what I mean? So it's not jumping.

• 1:04:54Speaker 03

  Are you picturing me to have more kids?

• 1:04:55Trevor Noah?

  No, no, no. But surprisingly, it really isn't. It isn't jumping in the same way. Now, costs might jump, and don't get me wrong on that side. But like, think of it this way. I love that you said that. We live in a world where everyone thinks, and I understand why people think this. Everyone thinks that they're doing it alone, right? So you're grinding alone, you're running alone, you're having a baby alone. You, everything you think you're doing alone. You really do think you're doing it alone. And the world, I think, tells you you're doing it alone. And then part of the way it does it to you, I feel, is it tricks us into rewarding us alone. I think that's like a key thing as well.

• 1:05:29Speaker 03

  Personal bonuses.

• 1:05:31Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, it's a personal bonus, and it's like, it's a private thing, and it's your money, you know? But if you, to your point, took on a little more load in your world for somebody else, you don't realize how you've given them a thousand times more space, right? So let's say a couple has their kids, and they say to all the parents in their group, "Hey, send your kids on every Thursday. We'll look after everyone's kids if you want." Like, we're gonna host like a little mini kindergarten type thing. Now, don't get me wrong, you might hate your Thursdays. You might be like, "Okay, this is war. Here we go. The invasion begins, 6:00 PM, it's on. We hate our lives." But the amount of space you've created for the other, let's say, five families

• 1:06:16Trevor Noah?

  that have dropped off their kids. It it scales exponentially, like way beyond what you are receiving as as load. Does that make sense?

• 1:06:24Speaker 03

  Yeah, for sure.

• 1:06:25Trevor Noah?

  They get to go off. They get to have a couples' date. They get to go work more if they need to. They get to go sleep. They get to do something. But if everyone is doing that on every day.

• 1:06:33Speaker 03

  That's true.

• 1:06:34Trevor Noah?

  All of a sudden, you're in a world where we, which we should be trying to get back to, which is what we had when we were growing up. I know our parents had a tough time in in South Africa. I know they did. But I can tell you, they didn't have as tough a time, contrary to what people may believe. Because you might think coming from a third world country means you'll have a harder time raising kids. I actually think a lot of it was easier because the load was always.

• 1:06:56Speaker 03

  Shared.

• 1:06:56Trevor Noah?

  The load was always shared.

• 1:06:57Speaker 03

  Sure. It's so funny you say that about like um community. Right now, I'd say one of the most invaluable members of my community is my god sister Emily.

• 1:07:05Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:06Speaker 03

  She moved in with us in January. And when I told like just strangers that, oh, yeah, my god sister's gonna move in with her. People are like, why would you want someone in the early twenties? That's so weird. I was like, yeah, you know, she's coming out to L A. She's got a job. I'm like, you know, I love her to bits. I love her parents. Just like, let her come live with us. And it's so, now I see the benefits of like intergenerational households.

• 1:07:28Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:28Speaker 03

  Because now Obi has someone to look to.

• 1:07:30Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 1:07:31Speaker 03

  Who's not as old as.

• 1:07:32Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 1:07:32Speaker 03

  Because she was, he was like, what are you? You're not a grown up. Like, he doesn't even know what this thing is. She was like, he was like, well, I am a grown up. I am a, I'm a young grown up. So he he has this thing to look to that he can play with, is like a pressure relief valve.

• 1:07:45Trevor Noah?

  Right.

• 1:07:45Speaker 03

  I just have another sister, a sister in the house. Do you know what I mean?

• 1:07:49Trevor Noah?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:07:49Speaker 03

  And then she has like an older sister, an older brother to kind of look up to, to ask questions to. And it's changed the rhythm of all of our lives. Like, she's up early in the morning because of the kids. I'm learning about Chapel Rowan and all these crazy people because of her.

• 1:08:03Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:04Speaker 03

  I'm like, what on earth is, no, but it's like, it's opening my mind. It's expanding my heart. And it's just like, we have a bigger family. Now, there's some cultures where you would never let someone live with you.

• 1:08:14Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:14Speaker 03

  That is not in your, but it's been one of the best things, I think, to happen to all of us.

• 1:08:19Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 1:08:19Speaker 03

  And then when we had Lewis's parents there, we had like the grandparents, the parents.

• 1:08:24Trevor Noah?

  And that's how it's supposed to be.

• 1:08:25Speaker 03

  Oh, the rhythm where we're living now.

• 1:08:27Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:28Speaker 03

  One's alone or you're having a two four family with two point five kids. That is not how it's we're actually all supposed to be communal.

• 1:08:35Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 1:08:35Speaker 03

  And have multiple generations in the same space and not having that is really bad for us.

• 1:08:40Trevor Noah?

  I think it's the worst thing that we've done.

• 1:08:42Speaker 04

  Well, I think about when I was little and staying at my grandparents if my mom had to go to work or like visiting my aunt or you know, whatever it was. And then my parents were separated for a little bit. So I go over to my dad's or whatever. And I was like, man, after what you just said and what you've been saying, I'm like, yeah, I spent just enough time with everyone that everyone liked me. Do you know what I mean? I didn't really have enough time to get on anybody's nerves in that way.

• 1:09:06Speaker 03

  You weren't a burden and your mom was a single mom, right? And that's crazy for a single, my son wasn't a burden because you can speak to most single mothers today. They're like, I'm.

• 1:09:15Trevor Noah?

  Overwhelmed.

• 1:09:16Speaker 03

  Over, I'm drowning.

• 1:09:18Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:09:18Speaker 03

  And it actually impacts the relationship I have with this kid because I'm always strained and I'm tense.

• 1:09:23Speaker 04

  Mm hmm.

• 1:09:24Speaker 03

  But just having that pressure relief valve like, oh, I like my kid.

• 1:09:27Speaker 04

  To be fair to my mom, it's like her breaks from me were work. But at the same time, sometimes it was just like going to my grandma's for no reason. So it's like, sometimes it was like, yeah, her break from me was having to like do her job. But at the same time, there were some times where I was just at my grandparents for no reason. And not no reason, but to spend time with them. And so it's like, I was such a mama's boy as well that like, by the time she comes to pick me up, I'm so excited and she can be excited. Because I'm like, ma.

• 1:09:56Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:09:56Speaker 04

  Whereas, oh, I remember one time, I don't know if my grandparents were sick or what it was, but I couldn't go over there. And it was just us and I was like, mm, I do talk a lot.

• 1:10:09Speaker 04

  And my mom wasn't even yelling at me or anything, but I could see it on her face where I was like, mm, this story is going on.

• 1:10:18Speaker 04

  I had to be like eleven or something. I was like, oof, oof. It was like I was old enough to like recognize in her face.

• 1:10:24Trevor Noah?

  Your, your, your, um, what do they call it again? Your self-awareness. That's like the age.

• 1:10:28Speaker 04

  It was like waking it and I was just like, oh, oh, and I want to get to the end, but she, she keeps looking at the ground. Oh, yeah.

• 1:10:38Trevor Noah?

  This was your first bombing in front of an audience?

• 1:10:40Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:10:41Trevor Noah?

  As a comic, you know that feeling where you're like,

• 1:10:43Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:10:43Trevor Noah?

  Should I finish the bit? Should I?

• 1:10:45Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:10:46Trevor Noah?

  Oh, I've lost them. Oh, I've lost them.

• 1:10:48Speaker 04

  Cause if I stop the story right now, I'm gonna seem like I have a head injury.

• 1:10:51Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 1:10:51Speaker 04

  She's gonna take me to the hospital. Cause I'm like gearing up and it's like, I don't think the turn is enough. Yeah.

• 1:10:58Speaker 03

  Trevor, you were raised like that, right?

• 1:11:00Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, I was completely.

• 1:11:01Speaker 03

  The village, compound, all your cousins.

• 1:11:02Trevor Noah?

  Can I, can I tell you? Probably one of the biggest things that keeps me afraid of having a kid, especially in America, is I, I just, I'm like, it, it doesn't seem like what you'd want a childhood to be.

• 1:11:15Speaker 03

  No, it's not.

• 1:11:16Trevor Noah?

  Also because of how they've robbed children of autonomy.

• 1:11:20Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:11:20Trevor Noah?

  Like, when I was a child, you know what my job was? Ninety-nine percent of the time, go play.

• 1:11:25Speaker 04

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:11:25Trevor Noah?

  That was like my job. That was like my official, if you said to me like, what is your job? I'd be like, ah, I gotta go play.

• 1:11:30Speaker 04

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:11:30Trevor Noah?

  My, my mom, my grandmother, they would say, go outside and play. You go play with other children. You go to the park, you meet the other kids at the park and you play.

• 1:11:39Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:11:40Trevor Noah?

  The, the park hierarchy figures itself out. There's a kid that swings the swing too hard, you might fall, you cry, then you stop crying. And then, when I walk past, past playgrounds today, there's a little prison yard.

• 1:11:53Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:11:54Trevor Noah?

  Every parent is watching every kid, like every parent, every parent.

• 1:11:57Speaker 03

  They're really surveilled, yeah.

• 1:11:59Trevor Noah?

  You could have two parents watching thirty kids. I think you'd be fine.

• 1:12:04Speaker 04

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:12:05Trevor Noah?

  I genuinely think you could be fine. I don't know why people don't have contracts at the park and just be like, alright, guys, who are the two parents of the day?

• 1:12:10Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:12:10Speaker 03

  Pedophiles, Trevor. We're all afraid of pedophiles.

• 1:12:13Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, but this is a, this is a overblown, it's a crazy, do you know how, you know, I've been on this deep dive recently of going down rabbit holes, seeing where our like fears and, and all these ideas came from. A few kids got kidnapped when the news thought it was the best story. And now everyone's like, every kid gets kidnapped. No, children don't get kidnapped.

• 1:12:33Speaker 03

  But also, who wants to take any kid? I'm not worried about my kids getting kidnapped.

• 1:12:37Trevor Noah?

  Kids don't.

• 1:12:37Speaker 03

  The kidnapper will bring them back.

• 1:12:39Trevor Noah?

  The number, and I know someone will be like, what about this kid? No, I'm not saying no kids get kidnapped, but I'm saying for the amount of stress that people have about it.

• 1:12:46Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:12:46Trevor Noah?

  Trust me, you could have two parents at a park. It's already fenced in. Tell the rest of the parents, go hang out, go have fun, go talk to each other, get to know each other, build your community. Let your kids figure it out. Kids are not. You if you're I can't imagine what it would be like watching my child slide down a slide every single time.

• 1:13:04Speaker 04

  Hmm.

• 1:13:05Speaker 03

  It's miserable.

• 1:13:05Trevor Noah?

  I would hate them and I would hate myself.

• 1:13:07Speaker 04

  Mm hmm.

• 1:13:08Trevor Noah?

  Daddy, look. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Daddy, look again. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Daddy, look again. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, at some point, and I I'm not saying that I don't wanna see the kids slide ever.

• 1:13:20Speaker 04

  Mm hmm.

• 1:13:21Trevor Noah?

  But I also want the kids to slide for themselves.

• 1:13:23Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:13:23Trevor Noah?

  I don't want the kids to live in a world where they're only sliding when daddy or mommy's looking. And I also want them to know that, like, you can fall off a slide.

• 1:13:30Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:13:30Speaker 04

  Mm hmm.

• 1:13:30Trevor Noah?

  I'm not gonna catch you. There's gonna be moments where you're gonna fall and you're just gonna hit the ground and you're gonna bump something and you're gonna smack something and you're gonna come back with like a bruise. Do you know how nice it was to go home to your parents and they go, what happened? Would like, imagine not having that.

• 1:13:44Speaker 04

  Yeah, no, cause then you have a story and I love to talk.

• 1:13:46Trevor Noah?

  You come home with. Judges back. But Christian, I wanted to know something, like, you you keep saying postpartum.

• 1:13:52Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 1:13:53Trevor Noah?

  For everyone, cause I mean.

• 1:13:56Speaker 03

  The fourth trimester, which I'm just.

• 1:13:58Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, I would love to know for for everyone, you know, for men, but for people who haven't had kids for. Please can you break this down? Like, everyone just talks about postpartum and then sometimes I'll hear people say postpartum, depression and but.

• 1:14:09Speaker 03

  Mm hmm.

• 1:14:10Trevor Noah?

  Wha- what is postpartum? Like, what is it actually?

• 1:14:12Speaker 03

  It's the immediate period.

• 1:14:13Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:14Speaker 03

  Um, after you've had a a child.

• 1:14:17Trevor Noah?

  Okay.

• 1:14:18Speaker 03

  After you've given birth, it goes up until, well, they say, the doctors say it takes two years for your body to be what it was before and it's never gonna be what it was before, but to like. Kinda get back to it and postpartum looks different for everyone, but there's this huge hormonal crash, cause your body's making all these hormones to grow the baby.

• 1:14:35Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:36Speaker 03

  And then there's this huge crash and that can mean lots of different things. Your hair falls out for a lot of women. I always, my hair falls out. I've every time.

• 1:14:43Trevor Noah?

  So you you lose the, like, or not lose, you have the baby.

• 1:14:46Speaker 03

  Yeah, your head grows in pregnancy, it's some of you glowing, your nails.

• 1:14:49Trevor Noah?

  Wow.

• 1:14:49Speaker 03

  And then you have the baby and all of those hormones, like progesterone, everything comes down. And um, I get horrible night sweats. That's my really gross thing. So in the night, I always have to, I wa- I have night sets so bad. My fingers wrinkle and I get shivers. So that wakes me up and I put on. New pyjamas every time. So you get stuff like night sweats, hair falling out. You know, in the immediate period when you're breast, if you're breastfeeding, your breasts get really engorged. And they like breastfeeding can be quite rocky for some people. Um. Your skin changes, obviously your body changes, all your organs are moving back into position, like your uterus is coming down again. Uh, you know, cause pregnancy moves your organs out the way. Um.

• 1:15:32Speaker 03

  And then for some women, that involves anxiety, depression, coming with the hormones also because the stress like. A newborn is like a very fragile thing. And I think from a completely like evolutionary biology perspective, your job is like to keep it alive. So it's just like you, some women get these things called phantom cries. You hear your baby crying, even though they're not crying. That must suck. Which, yeah, you're just like, the baby's crying and your husband's like, no, it's not. But it's just like, it's, it's all of these things at once. And all the research shows that women in cultures who are more supportive. Supported have less postpartum um anxiety. A big thing that actually helped me this time is that um. Our pediatrician, this amazing woman called Dr Priest, she does home visits.

• 1:16:16Speaker 03

  Um. So Dr Priest would come over and weigh Cora and ask any questions. At home. At home. Cause before I would have to go to a. A different facility, go see the pediatrician somewhere else. So I think a big part of what helped my postpartum this time that. Our pediatrician would come to the house, I'd be in my pyjamas. She'd do the exam and then she'd ask me like, how are you doing? And she'd just chat, check in, how's breastfeeding? Go. Oh, you, you're not sure about the latch? Have you thought about this? Have you thought about, well, her weight's great. We don't know. Oh. You know, it's just that having a, a, a, the person that was medically supervised to look after my child. Right. Was a big part in, and her coming to the home, that changed everything. Um.

• 1:16:56Speaker 03

  So I didn't have the postpartum anxiety that I typically have had in the past. And I think I had some of the confidence of a third time mum. Um. But, you know, postpartum is also a big identity shift because every time you have. Um. A baby, you do go through that shift. Mm hmm. And now it's like a new identity as a mum of three. Or as the kid at my kid's school said. Obie's mum, why are you always having babies?

• 1:17:25Speaker 03

  Big up to her. So like.

• 1:17:28Trevor Noah?

  Obi's mom, why are you always having babies?

• 1:17:31Speaker 03

  And for a lot of women, you don't wanna just be known as a mother, you still wanna feel like yourself, but you you have to find a new self every time. And that's very unsettling. You know, so like, postpartum is a big thing. And I think it's not necessarily recognized, it's not talked about, and there's a lot of shame around it, because no one wants to feel like they're weak or they're inadequate, you know? And I I still I still think that's, even in the most developed societies or more supportive society, we still haven't figured out how to help women in that next life phase.

• 1:18:03Trevor Noah?

  And and that's where I find in traditional cultures, I can speak specifically like in in South African ones, a lot of that load is just taken off your shoulders. So so for instance, one of the big ones is elderly women sort of tell you that you don't know what you're doing. And they're like, it's fine. They don't even give you the whole like, you're supposed to know what, no, no, no, no. They're just like, no, no, bring the kid, bring the baby. You don't know what you're doing. Go sleep, go sleep. Go sleep. And then they look after the baby, and someone cooks for you, and another person does your clothes, and they'll like make sure your clothes are clean, and they wash you, and they help you, and they comb your hair, then they bring the baby back. But the job of elderly women in a lot of like South African society and African society as a whole, they'll just be like, no, no, no, your job was to have the baby.

• 1:18:48Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:18:48Trevor Noah?

  Our job as the village is to help you raise the baby now. But you relax, you go sleep, you almost, I would be I would be intrigued to find out if anyone who grew up in a very traditional society, if they have phantom cries, because I feel like if you know that there are other women looking after the baby, I wonder if your brain can like actually turn off and go like, it's fine.

• 1:19:08Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:19:08Trevor Noah?

  They're not crying. And even if they were crying, somebody's there looking after them.

• 1:19:12Speaker 03

  Yeah. Well, I like for Obi and for Luna, I did a thing called Omogu, which is in Igbo culture, the forty days after you have a baby. My mom came, and my dad, being very modern, also joined my mom for this thing. The first time he did this, I can't believe I'm doing this. Women are supposed to do it. But he came out and they did all of that, like they'd made like the pepper soups and my mom was doing the belly binding and all of that stuff. This time. Time we we didn't do it. But yeah, that whole thing of being really having people around you. There's a TikTok video that's gone super viral um of as a group of black women. They drive up to their friend's house. They're playing Girl by Destiny's Child and they're screaming it. And the their friend closes the window and shuts the curtains. And they're like, girl, they're singing the song. They're like, you need to come outside.

• 1:19:57Speaker 03

  And they break down the door. Basically, she was postpartum and she'd been sending these texts about um not feeling too good. And and they were like, we were gonna, we broke down the door to see her. And I think like if you're in a culture where it's not like South Africa or Nigeria or like developing countries where the system is in place. Like, your friends need to be willing to like break down the door, like just intrude.

• 1:20:17Trevor Noah?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:20:17Speaker 03

  You know, like, cause in the West, you're so afraid of intruding.

• 1:20:20Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, your personal spaces is overly respected.

• 1:20:22Speaker 03

  You know, there's cultures where people just show up to your house. Here you plan.

• 1:20:25Trevor Noah?

  Hey, Josh, are you home?

• 1:20:26Speaker 03

  Yeah, you go to a restaurant here. You don't even go to people's house. I think, don't be afraid to intrude in those words like, you good? You good? You good? Because I think most women and men are afraid to ask for help. So you have to just like do the thing. Don't say, what do you need? Just do a thing.

• 1:20:42Trevor Noah?

  You know what we should do? We'll we'll actually have an episode on the, we should bring somebody on who like specializes on. I mean, the topic of maternity and the, cause I think, I think there's a, there's a, there's a lot in it that we could enjoy. Because I, one of the biggest things I've come to realize in having conversations about everything really is. You'll be shocked at how many times the thing that you think doesn't affect you completely affects you.

• 1:21:05Speaker 03

  Mm hmm.

• 1:21:05Trevor Noah?

  You know, so you think, oh, we're talking about pregnancy or postpartum. Most men will go, well, I guess I'm not part of this conversation. But even in the moments we've had here, I think about how many men out there are at an office now stressed out, out of their minds. And not figuring out what to do or emotionally drained because they don't feel like they're showing up for their kid. Or not understanding how to be supportive to their partner. You know, some men out there like Josh are not supporting pregnant women in their lives at all. They're not sticking around for the pregnancy.

• 1:21:37Speaker 04

  Doing my best. I'm only so involved. Cause it is not my child.

• 1:21:43Trevor Noah?

  No, but I I I think we should do it. We should have like a full on, you know?

• 1:21:47Speaker 03

  Okay, I have a question for both of you.

• 1:21:49Trevor Noah?

  Okay, what's, yeah, you had the Josh question. What's the Josh one?

• 1:21:51Speaker 03

  Do you want kids?

• 1:21:53Speaker 04

  Um, it's, yeah, yeah, it's, it's tough because I don't think so. And it used to just be my shortcomings as a person that I felt like I needed to figure out. And then it became a little bit of like how the state of the world and everything, which I know is like here and there, like that's, it's never gonna be a right time in the world to have a kid or anything. Um, but yeah, I guess I still don't know, which is like, you know, a, like a privilege and a luxury. I definitely feel like I need to figure it out in the next few years because I don't want to be an old dad. Do you know what I mean? Like, I don't wanna be one of those dads that becomes a dad at like fifty-five

• 1:22:37Speaker 04

  and then goes to pick up their kid and other kids are like, what's wrong with your dad?

• 1:22:42Speaker 03

  But you know what? All the dads now are old dads, by the way, Josh.

• 1:22:45Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah. So I guess it wouldn't be.

• 1:22:47Trevor Noah?

  And, and I will say, you might say old dad, I would say wise dad.

• 1:22:50Speaker 03

  Wise dad, yeah.

• 1:22:51Trevor Noah?

  Cause I find like older parents just carry themselves a little different. They may not be able to run and jump as high.

• 1:22:57Speaker 04

  Yeah, that's what I'm worried about is I can't play ball like a wise dad.

• 1:23:01Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, but you know what? A wise dad is more patient with their kid who can't hit the ball.

• 1:23:05Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, that's fair. Cause he also can't hit the ball.

• 1:23:08Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, exactly. Whereas a young dad is still out there being like, come on, hit the, come on. There's still a little too much testosterone. So I don't think, I don't think you've missed. And also just to the point you said previously, the, the world has never really been in a better place. I'll also say that.

• 1:23:22Speaker 04

  No, that's fair. And that, that's why.

• 1:23:23Trevor Noah?

  We think of it through the lens of like microplastics. There's, there was a time when one flu killed your whole family.

• 1:23:30Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:23:31Trevor Noah?

  Now imagine having a child during that time.

• 1:23:32Speaker 04

  Yeah. I think the reasons keep shifting, but I think when you're so unsure about something, it is, um, it's a, it's a real like sink or swim thing. Like if, if I'm making a decision that's career wise and I'm very unsure, I'm like, what am I really scared of? Maybe just do it and see what happens. But like another person is not a see what happens, you know? And I, and if anything, I've been like even more stressed out by my friends who kinda had that attitude. Where I was like, I was like. So when did you know or when did you feel? And they were like, ah. And I'm like, oh, oh, what? What do you? And then, and don't get me wrong.

• 1:24:14Speaker 04

  Those people, I think, are actually perfectly good parents because I think that they didn't go into it with that. They're probably the ones most likely to go ahead and be like, oh, you'll watch my kid for the afternoon? At the park? Oh, that's great. And then you'll, you'll find sometimes that the people who are like so well thought out and so overly helicopter make some of the most stressed out kids anyway.

• 1:24:37Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:24:37Speaker 04

  Cause they're so scared of making a mistake that now the kid is also, cause I, I don't know anything about having kids, but I imagine those first few years, it's gotta be a little bit like how when you have a, when you have like a, a dog and you're clearly nervous, you're making the dog nervous. Because this kid doesn't know what anything is.

• 1:24:57Trevor Noah?

  No.

• 1:24:57Speaker 04

  So they just see you going, and then they're like, okay, is that, is that life then?

• 1:25:02Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:25:02Speaker 04

  Should life be like that, you know? So.

• 1:25:04Speaker 03

  Trevor, do you want kids?

• 1:25:06Trevor Noah?

  Oh my, do I want kids? Ah, okay, how, how would I put it?

• 1:25:14Trevor Noah?

  I don't want kids, but I don't not want kids.

• 1:25:17Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 1:25:17Trevor Noah?

  Right? I would hope that kids would be the byproduct of something that I'm experiencing. But to have kids.

• 1:25:23Speaker 04

  Yeah, sex.

• 1:25:29Trevor Noah?

  Oh, man. Oh, but, but to have to, so, so here's, okay, here's why I'll, I'll say this. I have the luxury in that I don't have a body clock like a woman does. So I start with that. The second thing is.

• 1:25:41Speaker 03

  We'll put a pin in that, that's for another episode.

• 1:25:43Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, but I don't, I don't have a body clock in that way, right? Um, the other thing for me is that when I think of having a kid and I go like, why do you want a kid? It may be a little too esoteric, but I go, well, I don't want. My kids necessarily have the burden of me wanting them for that reason, to fulfill something in me or to not, you know?

• 1:26:03Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's great.

• 1:26:04Trevor Noah?

  I think it's important to not put that on the kid.

• 1:26:06Speaker 03

  You have ego death already when it comes to.

• 1:26:08Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, like I I I don't like it when people do that with kids, you know, they go like, I just want, some some people be like, they want something to be theirs. They want something to love them and then and then the kid doesn't do that and they and then you get like parents who guilt their kids. Why don't you, why don't you send your mom there? Or I can't believe, you know, I wanted a son who I'd be proud of. Like, what are you doing? What are you doing?

• 1:26:28Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:26:28Trevor Noah?

  I think genuinely, and I know it's not perfect, but I think a kid should be something where you you go like, I have so much love to give. That man, I just need another human being to pour this into. I just have too much love. I just gotta pour this love and pour this love and pour this love and pour this love out. So I'm neither for nor against kids. The only thing I know is I have never met a person who regrets having children.

• 1:26:50Speaker 03

  Oh, you haven't?

• 1:26:50Trevor Noah?

  Never. Genuinely, I've never.

• 1:26:52Speaker 03

  I have.

• 1:26:52Trevor Noah?

  But I've met many people who regret when they had a kid. And I've met many people who regret who they had the kid with. But I've never met somebody who regrets the kid themselves. Now, I'm sure there are outliers. I've met people who got with somebody abusive, alcoholic, you you name it in every shape and every way. But they will go, ah, but this child. I've met people who had a child and they're struggling financially and their life has really been hard and their family disowned them because of who they had the kid with and maybe the person left, whatever it is. They will still go, but this child, oh, man, this child. The person they had it with, they might regret.

• 1:27:33Trevor Noah?

  The circumstances, they might regret. Too young, too busy, too this, too this, too that. So in that way, in that way, I just think to myself, I would love to be able to give somebody the greatest gift, which is not just being chosen, but which is being intentional. That's that's all I'd want, you know? I want the kid, if they ask me like, hey, why am I here? I go like, no, because I just, I had excess love to give. And so that's that's why you're here.

• 1:27:59Speaker 03

  Amazing.

• 1:27:59Trevor Noah?

  You know what I mean? I just wanted somebody to love.

• 1:28:01Speaker 03

  I think you two both make great fathers. And I think.

• 1:28:05Trevor Noah?

  This is how she tricks people.

• 1:28:06Speaker 03

  No, wait, wait, wait, wait. I think you make great fathers and maybe one of the sad things about the world is that I have friends that are like child free by choice.

• 1:28:16Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:17Speaker 03

  And they'd make the most brilliant mothers or and fathers. And it's often the people that are making the real calculus who've done that deep spiritual work, who like experienced ego death, who make the decision not to be parents, who would make brilliant parents.

• 1:28:31Trevor Noah?

  I agree with you.

• 1:28:32Speaker 03

  And but at the end of the day, I think I don't see, I came to a point where I don't see my children as possessions. Maybe this is very Christian mentality of like, you know, a gift from God. God has given me them to kind of guide in this world and uncover who they're supposed to be. But they're not just mine. So I don't think you have to be have children yourself biologically to parent.

• 1:28:54Trevor Noah?

  To have children.

• 1:28:54Speaker 03

  And I feel like if we had a more expansive view of parenting, that the children around us are our collective responsibility. Yeah.

• 1:29:03Trevor Noah?

  This is literally Africa.

• 1:29:05Speaker 03

  Then it's like, it's like, do you want biological children that live in your house?

• 1:29:09Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, that's all it is.

• 1:29:10Speaker 03

  Question, but then it's just like, you can have children via other means.

• 1:29:13Trevor Noah?

  Yes.

• 1:29:14Speaker 03

  Then, because I don't, my kids aren't my possessions. I'm just their custodians. I'm here to like.

• 1:29:18Trevor Noah?

  Yeah.

• 1:29:18Speaker 03

  Guide them.

• 1:29:18Trevor Noah?

  My dream is, and I will also caveat this because I don't want to fall into a Josh Johnson here. But like, Michael Jackson messed it up. I'll start with that. Because my dream was always, I was always like, I always wanted to create spaces in my house that would be great for kids that weren't mine. Because I thought it would be fun when my friends' kids come over.

• 1:29:39Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:29:40Trevor Noah?

  They go like, oh, Uncle Trevor's house. And he's got those video games and he's got an arcade machine. And I'm like, yeah, this is great for them.

• 1:29:46Speaker 03

  Mm hmm.

• 1:29:47Trevor Noah?

  You know what I mean? I like the fact that.

• 1:29:48Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:29:48Trevor Noah?

  And people go like, but you don't have kids. I'm like, yes, but there will be children in my life. And I think it is cool that I can facilitate this for them in some way, shape or form.

• 1:29:56Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:29:56Trevor Noah?

  But now, if you are a grown man with no kids, who has a kid's basement full of things.

• 1:30:02Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:30:03Trevor Noah?

  So, yeah.

• 1:30:04Speaker 04

  No, there are problems. Yeah, yeah. But I, I will say though, one thing, last thing, that I think could be helpful. And this is maybe gonna make you take back what you said about me being a good dad.

• 1:30:15Speaker 03

  Never.

• 1:30:17Speaker 04

  Maybe it's a.

• 1:30:18Speaker 03

  Not possible, Josh.

• 1:30:18Speaker 04

  But this is, this is, you know, in, in a co-parenting situation, especially a situation where kind of like you said, Trevor, people are like, mm, it shouldn't have been this person or something like that. I think that one, one like sort of olive branch, one thing that you could do is be like, all right, look, let's be honest with each other as like mom and dad. Let's be honest with each other. You don't really want to be here, right? But you could help me out. Every time you are here, it's gonna be like a big celebration. It's gonna be like, wow, dad's here, blah, blah, right? But because I'm with the kids almost all the time, you have to tell the kids, hey, if you act up, if you disrespect your mom in any way, I can't come in the house. Mm, there's just something, I, I don't know, I don't know.

• 1:31:00Speaker 04

  It's like, it's like, I wa- I wish I could be there, but you, you were mean to your mom.

• 1:31:04Trevor Noah?

  Damn, Josh.

• 1:31:05Speaker 04

  And so dang, I can't.

• 1:31:06Trevor Noah?

  Don't, don't do that.

• 1:31:07Speaker 04

  And then, and now.

• 1:31:09Trevor Noah?

  Don't do that, Josh.

• 1:31:09Speaker 03

  You know what?

• 1:31:10Trevor Noah?

  This is psychological warfare.

• 1:31:11Speaker 04

  Now, I wouldn't do this because I would want to be there. But I'm saying, if you already know this person's a deadbeat, then I could be there anyway.

• 1:31:17Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, that's.

• 1:31:17Speaker 04

  At least game the system a little bit. Be like, be like, ah, I have to move now. You were so mean to your mom.

• 1:31:24Trevor Noah?

  Oh, my God. Can you imagine?

• 1:31:25Speaker 04

  Oh, man.

• 1:31:25Trevor Noah?

  Can you imagine the stress a kid is having?

• 1:31:27Speaker 03

  The damage, the therapy.

• 1:31:28Trevor Noah?

  My dad didn't come because of me. I didn't do it. Yo, but this was fun.

• 1:31:32Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 1:31:32Trevor Noah?

  Christiana, congratulations.

• 1:31:33Speaker 03

  Thank you.

• 1:31:34Speaker 04

  Congratulations.

• 1:31:35Trevor Noah?

  On a third healthy child. This is, can I tell you, that's the only thing I like, I, you know?

• 1:31:40Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:31:40Trevor Noah?

  I don't take for granted the health of a mother, the health of a black mother, by the way.

• 1:31:44Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:31:44Trevor Noah?

  It's no joke. Yo, so I'm happy that your baby's healthy. I'm happy that you are healthy. We're here, huh?

• 1:31:51Speaker 04

  Making more people like Christiana.

• 1:31:54Speaker 03

  Still making a podcast.

• 1:31:55Trevor Noah?

  Yeah, my, my favorite thing I learned when I was in Bhutan from a monk was he taught me, he said, uh, he said, one of the hardest things to learn in life is that there will always be storms. But you will never live a full life unless you realize when you are between storms.

• 1:32:14Trevor Noah?

  So he says like the greatest joy in life is just learning to know when you are between storms. Because when you're in a storm, you're in a storm. But when you're not in a storm and you don't realize you're not in a storm, then you're not enjoying the fact that you're not in a storm. And so I'm excited because now with Christiana, we're no longer in a storm.

• 1:32:33Trevor Noah?

  She's not pregnant for a while. And so we get to enjoy that for a minute.

• 1:32:37Speaker 03

  Not for a while. She's not gonna be pregnant again.

• 1:32:39Trevor Noah?

  You know what? I will take it as it comes. And if you get pregnant again, we will celebrate it. But for now, we will enjoy this. This was fun, y'all.

• 1:32:48Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:32:54Trevor Noah?

  What Now with Trevor Noah is produced by Spotify Studios in partnership with Day Zero Productions. The show is executive produced by Trevor Noah, Sanaz Yamin, and Jodi Avigan. Our senior producer is Jess Hackel. Claire Slaughter is our producer. Music, mixing, and mastering by Hannes Brown. Thank you so much for listening. Join me next Thursday for another episode of What Now.

• 1:33:35Speaker 05

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• 1:33:49Speaker 05

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• 1:34:04Speaker 02

  From the original Free Second Opinion studio, here's Hugh Joyce.

• 1:34:10Trevor Noah?

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