Marc Maron warned listeners at the beginning of the latest episode of his “WTF” podcast on Monday: “If you don’t like Jews, you’re gonna get triggered.”
It was a fair disclaimer, given that his hour-long conversation with Seth Rogen touched on just about every general aspect of modern Jewish identity, from Jewish summer camp to cultural Jewishness to sitting shiva.
But a second warning came part of the way through the episode, as the conversation turned to Israel. “We’re gonna piss off a bunch of Jews,” Maron said.
Rogen, who grew up attending Jewish schools and Jewish camp in Vancouver, said he was “fed a huge amount of lies about Israel” and questioned why the state should exist. Maron, who often references his Jewishness in his standup comedy material, concurred.
“To me it just seems an antiquated thought process. If it is for religious reasons, I don’t agree with it, because I think religion is silly. If it is for truly the preservation of Jewish people, it makes no sense, because again, you don’t keep something you’re trying to preserve all in one place — especially when that place is proven to be pretty volatile, you know? ‘I’m trying to keep all these things safe, I’m gonna put them in my blender and hope that that’s the best place… that’ll do it.’ It doesn’t make sense to me. And I also think that as a Jewish person I was fed a huge amount of lies about Israel my entire life! They never tell you that — oh by the way, there were people there. They make it seem like it was just like sitting there, like the fucking door’s open!…They forget to include the fact to every young Jewish person.
I’m afraid of Jews! I’m 100% afraid of Jews.”
The entire conversation was what Maron called “the most Jewy talk” he has had on his popular podcast, which has aired over 1,100 episodes. Rogen was on the show to discuss his upcoming film “An American Pickle,” about a Jewish immigrant who falls into a vat of pickles in New York in 1919 and wakes up 100 years later.