i dont think most actual smart leftist debaters want to debate ben, not because they're scared he'll outfox them, but because it will be turned into 100 soundbytes of "BEN DESTROYS LEFTIST WITH FACTS" montages on youtube and they'll never escape it.

he gets paid a stupid amount by college republicans to do speeches where all he does is extend his schtick from his show where he also makes a shit load of money to the stage. from there its a binary choice, do a Q&A or don't. its his brand to do a Q&A and the most cringey people known to man for some reason flock to ask him idiotic questions that he smashes for homeruns because they're stupid questions.

is he the smartest man of all time, a Hawking level 200+ IQ? no, but he's still likely in the top 1-2% of IQs like i said.

most of all tho i'd say Ben is honest to what he believes for the most part, his anti-Trans obsession actually stems from his belief that the culture war is anti religious and a serious issue for mankind to defeat moving forward. Crowder and Rubin are liars through and through. no different than Blaire White, Aunt Tom for cash. Ben really does believe his message imo.

I think Ben believes some of what he says, and actively plays up a lot of other things to rile people up.

Ben himself can be as smart as he wants, the character he plays is a dumb person's idea of a smart person. And that character is pretty dumb as a result. But he is good at playing it.

Like how Colbert played a dumb guy for a long time. Except instead of being a liberal playing a dumb conservative, Ben is a smart guy playing a dumb conservative.

This post was edited by NetflixAdaptationWidow on Apr 19 2022 11:32am

i used to watch his show daily, but dont anymore. when i read takes like this i often think they're formed by watching clips like the OP posted rather than the breadth of his content.

the only dumb takes i saw him consistently offer were on Israel and on trans issues, not because he's objectively wrong but because he overhypes the importance.

Jordan Peterson IMO fits the description you offered far more, he's no where near as smart as his fanboys seem to think he is.

I see Peterson and Shapiro as being pretty much the same character played slightly differently. Peterson plays it from the angle of the philosophical smart person while Ben shapiro plays it from the angle of the technical autist

I likely haven't listened to as much Shapiro as you, but I used to listen to him on the radio. It's not all clips.

Let's be perfectly honest here though, he had lots of dumb takes consistently in the past. He still massively downplays the impacts of climate change. He still says "well, humans will adapt" and then go on to rail against green energy initiatives and other forms of adaptation.

So yeah, lots of dumb takes that he still makes to this day.

This post was edited by NetflixAdaptationWidow on Apr 19 2022 11:45am

he reacts to hyperbole in order to avoid being wrong. laughing at the clearly unrealistic line items of the Green New Deal is a smart strategy to get viewers. talking about the feasible side of green energy like slight tax initiatives on US made solar panels is like watching paint dry to just about everyone.

what i judge him on is cases like the Kyle Rittenhouse trial, where he correctly called out the legalities at play.

overall tho during the trump era he was vocally against trump enough that if he were on fox news he'd have been fired.

he's pretty now

You kek’d lil ol’ Bennie boy

I mean yeah, he's playing a character to appeal to an audience. He's not a "smart guy conservative" as much as he's "what conservatives think smart guys sound like so he can get views".

Which is basically all JP is as well. They play the part to get the views because there's a ton of money in conservative anger.

As such I don't really care if he gets some things right when they align with conservative talking points, because he's not there to be right even if he's capable of it.

He seems really nice finally, i was wrong all long.

Ben shapiro superfan meww posts ben shapiro's latest video again with zero context.

You must be a marketing genius.