JOE ROGAN and MATT WALSH

A few things up front. First, I’m more or less neutral on Joe Rogan. If you don’t know who Joe Rogan is: Where have you been living for the past decade? He is a mega-popular podcaster, comedian, TV personality, actor, fitness guru of sorts. He has something close to 13 million subscribers, and over 2 billion views. He hosts The Joe Rogan Experience. Of course I’ve heard the hubbub about Rogan for years now; on the left he is a right-wing fascist who is in the old-school Gen-X/Early Boomer mold. On the right he is more or less considered some form of hero. He has been a trailblazer in podcasting and has been foremost in draining followers from traditional media and TV. He recently switched to Spotify for a ludicrous amount of money.

Rogan has dialogued and debated with all kinds of people, from Jordan Peterson to Alex Jones to Douglas Murray to, yesterday (11/7/2022), the right-wing commentator Matt Walsh. Walsh writes at The Daily Wire, which I do not subscribe to. Walsh has recently become semi-famous and embroiled in a political controversy over his Daily Wire documentary, What is a Woman?, wherein he basically wanders the country asking trans people this very basic question. I have not seen the film. I admit to being cautiously curious. Probably I will watch it soon.

This interview from yesterday with Walsh—episode #1895—is three hours and eight minutes long. (Much of the appeal in contemporary times of podcasts versus legacy media is the fact that you can have authentic, in-depth conversations which don’t seek click-bait mini-sound bites but rather foster genuine dialogue.) For the record I am a big podcast listener. My favorites are 1. The 5th Column; 2. Sam Harris (Making Sense); 3. Bill Maher; 4. Coleman Hughes. (Not necessarily in that order.) Podcasts, in my opinion, are far superior to traditional 24-hour media because hosts can discuss whatever they want and fairly honestly, at least more so than say CNN or MSNBC. Of course many pods have advertisers which certainly must limit, to some degree, what can safely be said or not. (With the exception of The 5th Column and Sam Harris, who do not have ads.)

I don’t want to get too into the weeds in this post about either Joe Rogan himself or Matt Walsh. But I did find a few things interesting about the interview. Besides being a Substack writer and developmental book editor, I also walk dogs on the side, and I walked three dogs in a row while listening to the discussion between these two men.

My first observation is that Walsh seemed to be pretty vague in general. Full disclaimer, I myself identify as a center-left free-thinking contrarian, skeptic, critical thinker. I’ve only ever voted for Democrats my whole voting history, and I’m including not only national but regional and local races. So that should tell you something. Since 2016—basically since Trump’s rise to power—I have become totally unmoored from the Republican side. They seem to have more or less lost contact with sanity and reality once Trump rattled everyone’s political and cognitive cages like the wild gorilla he is. Being a classical liberal has never been less popular than now, at least as displayed by the major news media.

QUOTE: Rogan: “There’s not a compromise in gay men that want to be married, love and want to formalize their bond so they can see their partner if there’s a medical emergency or if there’s a death where you assign assets to your loved one?”

That said, I also do understand to a large degree why people—especially white working-class voters—cast their ballots for Trump. (This is for another post sometime. Main thing to understand: Most Trumpers didn’t vote FOR Trump; rather they voted AGAINST the Democratic party, and I can see why.) Over the past six years I have watched, sadly, as the extreme wing of the Democratic party has moved further and further away from coalition-building and sanity and closer and closer to the exact reverse side of the nutty Trumpers they claim are evil. When you move far enough to the left you end up holding hands with the right. Two sides of the same extremism coin. Both sides now lie. Alternative facts affect both fringes. And both fringes to some degree own their respective parties. On one hand you’ve got Q-ANON and election deniers; on the other you have “pregnant men” and an untrue myth about police brutality which simply isn’t happening. (Check the Washington Post’s police killings database.)

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I went into the Walsh interview with an open mind. Despite his being right-wing, I am curious about his film. Whenever the far left vehemently rejects something nowadays, be it podcast, film, book, speech, etc…there’s usually something important to look at; often all the nuance and meaning and true aim of the thing, whatever it may be, has been sucked out of the leftist discussion.

Walsh arguably started out strong. (Yet he was pretty vague when describing his views on trans kids.) But, when Rogan asked Walsh how many minors were likely on puberty-blockers in the country, Walsh admitted he didn’t know but then said it had to be “in the millions.” Rogan fact-checked him and the number was abysmally low; in the thousands at best. Walsh owned his mistake…but it’s a telling mistake. If he got that detail wrong: What else did he potentially get wrong? There was a trust-line stepped across there, for me.

I also had a general feeling that Walsh’s tone was a bit overly alarmist, dramatic and agenda-based. Biased, I suppose, is the word. And look: No shit, right? Bias is a human trait and it’s on both sides, clearly. But the tone of his voice, coupled with this alarmist sensation I felt, plus his gaff on a major data point; all of this sort of made me squirm.

But it was the last 45 minutes or so of the interview which really made me question Walsh. Rogan, as I said, has always been targeted as a right-wing guy, despite the fact that he’s dialogued with people from all across the political spectrum and has discussed what he considers to be his own classically liberal views. They got into a heated but respectful (which is crucial for fostering a non-censorious environment) disagreement about, mainly, marriage and family and gay rights.

Walsh repeatedly stated that marriage is, according to “Christian morality” (which he adheres to) solely between a man and a woman. This is not new rhetoric, obviously. Conservatives have been screeching this for decades. Walsh’s point seemed to be that marriage is not solely a legal agreement but is basically for more or less one single purpose: Procreation.

Now, I don’t dispute that this is essentially where the institution of marriage stems from originally. It’s to bind the man and woman so they can exist legally and cohabitate and bear children and rear a family. (And so the man can unfairly acquire the woman’s dowry.) However, clearly times change. We’re in the second decade of the twenty-first century. The gay rights movement has shifted the narrative around marriage. Fewer straight people, especially in major cities like San Francisco, New York City, Portland, Chicago, are bearing children. Many are choosing to not even get married, or if they do it’s because they want a legal bond, not for kids but for travel, love, tax purposes. It has in many ways become more of a symbolic act.

Somehow Walsh seems threatened by the notion that men can marry men, women can marry women, and more and more straight young people are choosing to either not have kids and/or not get married. Walsh believes it is a societal “duty” to produce children in a marriage. He seems to have a sort of “originalist” conception of marriage and family. (Just like constitutional originalists who believe everything written in the original document should apply now.) And look: I do think in general that having two caring parents raising a child is better than one parent. And I do think that encouraging family is a good thing in general. Much has been rightly said about low-income communities, cross-racially, and coming from poor single-family homes. But, like Rogan, I don’t think those two parents necessarily have to be “heterosexual.” Why are two male parents bad? Or two female parents? Or for that matter two trans parents?...

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The Secret Sauce to Being a Good Writer (posted on legendary publishing expert JANE FRIEDMAN'S BLOG)

*On October 27, 2022 I was beyond honored to have my essay on writing (The Secret Sauce to Being a Good Writer) published on Jane Friedman's blog. If you don't know who Jane Friedman is click HERE. I'll start the essay here and you can link at the end to Jane's blog to read the rest. As always, please check out and subscribe to my Substack Newsletter, "Sincere American Writing" (CLICK HERE FOR MY SUBSTACK).

***

The Secret Sauce to Being a Good Writer

Honestly, the No. 1 thing is: Ignore 99.999% of the industry fluff you hear about online. (Yes, I’m aware of the irony I am demonstrating here.) It’s not that people online are trying to fool you on purpose, necessarily, but rather that they all have their own agenda. (And, frankly, bottom lines.)

Here’s a controversial opinion: Writers are born, not made. You heard me right. Let me unpack that.

If you’re a natural-born writer, then you’ll write your ass off either way. If you’re not, no amount of classes or workshops will change that in a fundamental way. To be clear: Sometimes it takes “real” writers years, even decades, to succeed.

A great example is my good writer-friend Allison Landa, whose memoir, Bearded Lady: When You’re a Woman with a Beard, Your Secret Is Written All Over Your Face was finally just published by Woodhall Press after a 17-year (yep!) journey to publication, which had begun while she was still in the MFA program at St. Mary’s.

This doesn’t mean that because you have the internal drive to write but haven’t pumped out profound prose that you “aren’t a writer.” It probably means that you simply have to try harder or in more efficient ways. But sometimes, sadly, yes, there are people who wish they were writers, who enjoy writing sometimes or even often, but alas are not writers for one simple reason: They don’t have that deep, driving force which animates their lust for communication with other human beings via words on the page.

There’s nothing wrong with this. Not everyone is meant to be a teacher or a doctor or a lawyer. Not everyone, ergo, is a writer. In our contemporary culture of constant uplift and positivity, I think what sometimes gets lost is the torn, ragged flag of reality. Because some people are writers and others aren’t doesn’t make this statement pretentious; on the contrary (as Dostoevsky would quip), it makes it honest. (Of course, just my humble opinion.)

The second thing about being a writer is: My God, read a LOT. I mean A LOT. And in multiple genres.

Here’s a gold quote from Stephen King’s classic memoir/writing instruction manual, On Writing: “If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot. There’s no way around these two things that I’m aware of, no shortcut. If you don’t have time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that.”

This is a tough one, isn’t it? Especially in the frenetic, busy landscape of contemporary life. Besides your day job, you have kids, a mortgage, or rent, student loans, podcasts, TV shows, friends, enemies, and of course the insipid omnipresence of everything ONLINE, from Facebook to Twitter to LinkedIn, etc. Choose your poison, really.

My point is: We are blanketed in and constantly pounded at by distractions. It’s incessant. The crucial key here is: Find the time to read. (And to write, of course; you’ve got to write as often as you can.)

CLICK HERE TO READ THE REST ON JANE FRIEDMAN'S BLOG...

THE TWO PILLARS OF NOVEL STRUCTURE ACCORDING TO JAMES SCOTT BELL

I want to talk briefly about novel structure because, as a novel editor, I see all kinds of basic issues from the majority of the aspiring writer-clients I work with. There is a wealth of info out there on the web but I wanted to give you a little taste of what makes a solid novel. Because, especially if you write commercial fiction and hope to land an agent and get published, novel structure is incredibly important to pay attention to.

The basic concept of the three-act novel structure dates back to Aristotle from his “Poetics” (335 BCE) in which he studies dramatic structure in plays of the ancient Greeks. In modern times, the three-act structure has been more sharply defined and explored by Joseph Campbell, author of such classics as “The Hero’s Journey” and “The Power of Myth,” among many others.

Campbell’s three-act novel structure included Act One (the setup); Act Two (the confrontation); and Act Three (the resolution). In Act One is the “inciting” incident, the event which propels the character into the story journey. There is a climax at the end of Act One which pushes the character into Act Two. In Act Two the MC (Main Character) pushes through obstacles galore, chasing their goal. There is ascending action and there is a mid-point twist, more obstacles, a disaster, and then the climax of Act Two, which forces the MC into Act Three. In Act Three there is the climax and then descending action and the denouement (wrap up) and the end.

Setup, confrontation, and resolution.

And then there is, most recently, James Scott Bell, a master of the modern day thriller and author of such writing how-to books as “Plot and Structure,” “Revision and Self Editing,” “The Art of War for Writers,” “Conflict and Suspense,” and many more.

Bell wrote an article a few years back (CLICK HERE FOR THE LINK TO BELL’S ARTICLE) titled “The Two Pillars of Novel Structure.” I am going to give you a rough, general sketch of what that article says and also relate it to my own experience working with writers.

You can’t just “write a book” and be done with it. Not if you expect to sell. Not if you expect to write engaging, suspenseful prose and a book that readers simply cannot put down. There are Reader Expectations that writers need to know about. Readers themselves often don’t know they demand certain things from novels…but they do. And, as a writer, if you don’t know what those demands are…you’ll likely be dead in the water before you even get to page 10.

Bell talks about this idea of writing “hot” and editing/revising “cold.” The first draft is never going to be ready to go anywhere except into a drawer for a few weeks or a month until you reread it as objectively as possible then take the red pen out and revise/rewrite. So, write that first draft with passion; write hot. But when you pause and return with the sacred (and infuriating!) red pen, write cold; in other words, look at structure. Because in the first draft you were getting sucked into the world (hopefully), focusing instead on character and world-building and dialogue, etc.

Bell uses the metaphor of story structure being like a suspension bridge. The two key foundations are there holding up the bridge, the pillars. He says: “Every story has to begin, and every story has to end. And the middle has to hold the reader’s interest.” Right. The middle. The hardest and longest portion of your novel. Kind of a tall order, huh?

“The craft of structure tells you how to begin with a bang, knock readers out at the end, and keep them turning pages all the way through,” Bell continues. “When you ignore structure, your novel can begin to feel like one of those rope bridges swinging wildly in the wind over a 1,000-foot gorge. Not many readers are going to want to go across.”

THE FIRST PILLAR

Bell lets us know that the beginning of a novel should do a few things: Let us know who the protagonist is; introduce the Story Problem/Goal; set the tone/introduce the voice; and set the stakes. Getting to the first pillar is what he calls The Door of No Return. (This is like Campbell’s The Hero’s journey; descent into hell and return). Once the character passes through this door, BEFORE the 1/5th mark of your novel, they cannot return. They have walked through a one-way-only portal.

Bell mentions also that the protagonist must suffer and struggle. I tell this to clients all the time. Readers read for two main reasons: To empathize and to sympathize. They want to relate to your character and feel their pain, and yet also, at the same time, they want to think, “God, I’m sure glad I’m not them!” It’s the irony of the human condition. Bell says, “A successful novel is about high-stakes trouble. True character is revealed only in crisis.” Bell calls the opening issue the “opening disturbance.” The MC should experience this in the opening pages.

Then the first pillar thrusts the MC into Act Two. The character wants to stay in the “ordinary” world but now cannot and is instead, against their will, thrust into the “dark world” of Act Two. From now on their will be major troubles and hurdles/obstacles that the MC must push through and barely survive.

Act Two is all about “death stakes.” Bell explains the three types of death: physical, professional, psychological. Your character must face one of the three or more. Remember (and this is key): Your MC MUST change/transform through the journey. By the end of the novel they must be different than they were on page one, and we must have seen that transformation throughout the novel. Think of your overarching Story Question (also called Premise or Theme).

Bell says, “…in novels it’s best to have that first doorway appear earlier. In a fast-moving action novel like The Hunger Games, it can happen quickly. It’s in chapter 1 that Katniss hears her sister’s name chosen for the games, and in the beginning of chapter 2 volunteers to take her place.” Bell uses several examples in his article to demonstrate the passage of the first pillar. One is Clarice Starling in “The Silence of the Lambs.” Starling is thrust into a psychological game with Lecter and this might possibly be the only way she can ultimately solve the case.

THE SECOND PILLAR

The second pillar is another Doorway of No Return, only this pillar makes the final resolution necessary. This act, in the middle of the two pillars (on the “bridge”) is where all the action happens. “The second act is a series of actions where the character confronts and resists death, and is opposed by counterforces.” There are obstacles in the MC’s way and the MC must fight. No exceptions. At last the second pillar/doorway opens in the form of a major crisis or setback, clue or discovery. It forces the MC into Act Three and the final battle and resolution.

In Bell’s article he goes over these points with a fine-tooth comb. He asks simple novel-in-progress questions related to these points, to get you going in the right direction. The main thing to remember is that almost all good novels that sell (or 99 percent of them) have some type of basic novel structure. Learn it, live it, love it. If you allow the basic three act structure and the two pillar structure idea to seep into your consciousness, you are that much closer to creating a kick-ass novel that readers won’t be able to put down.

And when you’re ready come hire me for the developmental editing.

Write on.

Michael Mohr

*Subscribe to my Substack Writing Newsletter: https://michaelmohr.substack.com/

“You said it. Let’s edit.”

Michael Mohr

*** My rates, info on what developmental and line editing are, my bio, and other info is on this website. If you have a project and are interested in the next level please email me: michaelmohreditor@gmail.com.