Latest news with #BenShapiro
Daily Mail
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
'Middle aged' Taylor Swift blasted for 'masquerading as a 17-year-old' by MAGA ally as he reveals major problem with celebrity culture
Taylor Swift was called 'middle aged' by a conservative media pundit who launched a scorched-earth tirade that claimed the pop star was just one of many aging entertainers 'masquerading as 17-year-olds.' Ben Shapiro of The Daily Wire issued a devastating takedown that called out a handful of celebrities who he said failed to 'grow up' in a desperate attempt to remain culturally relevant. 'You see it in the lyrics of a Taylor Swift also who pretends to be a lovelorn 16-year-old girl, when in fact Taylor Swift is currently age 35,' he said on his podcast. Shapiro has been a vocal critic of the popstar for months, celebrating trolls who booed her at the Super Bowl as she cheered on her boyfriend Travis Kelce. But she wasn't the only celebrity to be caught in his crosshairs on Wednesday. Shapiro also raged against Katy Perry and Jennifer Lopez, who sparked age-related criticism for her group make out session with multiple backup dancers during a performance at the American Music Awards. The red-wing hero, who admitted he is a 'fuddy-duddy grumpy old man,' lamented that the A-listers' behavior is a reflection of a modern-day cultural flaw in society. 'There is this thing that's happening in our culture where a bunch of people are masquerading as 17-year-olds who are actually middle-aged,' he said. When did we decide that adults are going to be the new kids? — The Ben Shapiro Show (@BenShapiroShow) May 28, 2025 ft-theo-von-and-jennifer-lopez-for-masquerading-as-17-year-olds%2F] 'If you are of middle age, you should act like you are middle age... Like you're not a 17-year-old, or a 21-year-old trying desperately to gain attention.' 'Middle aged' is technically defined in the United States as aged between 40 and 60. Setting his sights on 40-year-old Katy Perry, Shapiro said the I Kissed A Girl hitmaker is 'making a fool of herself doing her international tours right now.' Perry has faced mounting criticism for her poor album sales and mocked for her 'midlife crisis' after an ill-fated trip to space. But Shapiro reserved potentially his most scathing criticism for 45-year-old fellow podcaster Theo Von. 'I enjoy Theo Von as much as the next guy — although I think that his political takes are insanely stupid... I mean, Theo Von's a comedian. That's fine, it's also worth noting Theo Von is 45 years old,' Shapiro pointed out. 'Theo Von is four years older than I am. In the olden days, Theo Von would be closing in on the gold watch and retirement, and he dresses like a skater who's 16 years old, wears his hat backwards, and acts as though he's a refugee from the stoners club in junior high. 'It's a little weird... I see a bunch of people who are sort of in the podcast space, who are cosplaying at being 17-year-old Beavis and Butthead types.' Shapiro's comments sparked a wave of backlash on X as audiences questioned why he would care about the behavior of strangers. 'You're jealous, aren't you?' one critic asked. 'People flew all over the world to see Taylor Swift, and you're barely a blip on a list of podcasts. You lose.' Another wrote: 'The s**t you care about is f***ing ridiculous.' Shapiro anticipated the backlash and conceded that he was on the opposite end of the spectrum compared to the celebrities he complained about, admitting: 'I've been 80 since I was 15.' 'I am a fuddy-duddy. I am a grumpy old man. I've always been a grumpy old man. I was a grumpy old man when I was a teenager.' But he argued that his analysis uncovered something deeper about American society. 'There is something strange about a country that is rapidly aging in which because we are rapidly aging, and we don't have enough kids, we have decided that adults are going to be the new kids,' he said. 'We're going to treat 40-year-olds as though they are 20, and 60-year-olds as though they are 30. It's a strange look. It's very, very weird. 'Are we gonna do this forever? Is everybody just gonna turn into Madonna, twerking her way to glory with two artificial hips at the age of 92?' Shapiro's reference to Madonna comes after Jennifer Lopez reused her 22-year-old stunt at the AMAs. Madonna first the stage kiss to stun audiences back in 2003, when she shockingly pulled a then-21-year-old Britney Spears and 22-year-old Christina Aguilera into a three-way smooch at the MTV Video Music Awards. At the AMAs, the 55-year-old singer locked lips with both a male and a female dancer on stage, sparking theories she was desperately trying to make her ex-husband Ben Affleck jealous.
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Ben Shapiro Gripes About Middle-Aged Celebs Acting Like 17-Year-Olds
Ben Shapiro found yet another thing to gripe about on Wednesday, and this time it was *checks notes* middle-aged celebrities. In a bizarre, ageist rant that seemed like the audio equivalent of Grandpa Simpson shaking his fist at a cloud, the conservative podcaster accused celebrities of a certain age like Taylor Swift,Jennifer Lopez and comedian Theo Von of 'masquerading as 17-year-olds.' It started because Shapiro had a problem with kissing both a man and a woman during a recent concert. Although Shapiro admitted Lopez is an 'amazing looking 55-year-old person,' he claimed the smooches were proof of 'this thing that's happening in our culture where a bunch of people are masquerading as 17-year-olds who are actually middle-aged.' The 41-year-old Shapiro later admitted that he has been a 'grumpy old man' since he was a teenager and apparently thought that gave him the gravitas to call out other people in or near his age bracket. 'Like if you are of middle age, you should act like you are middle age,' he said, while insisting he didn't mean people 'have to be a fuddy-duddy,' though he later admitted to being one. 'I do mean that you should act like an adult,' he continued. 'Like you're not a 17-year-old, or a 21-year-old trying desperately to gain attention. You see this with Katy Perry also, right? Katy Perry is also making a fool of herself doing her international tours right now. Being silly. And you see it in the lyrics of Taylor Swift also, who pretends to be a lovelorn 16-year-old girl, when in fact Taylor Swift is currently age 35.' Although Swift, Lopez and Perry all just happened to endorse Kamala Harris for president in 2024, Shapiro's rant against his fellow middle-agers wasn't strictly partisan. He also singled out comedian Theo Von, who interviewed Trump during his campaign, for dressing 'like a skater who's 16 years old, wears his hat backwards, and acts as though he's a refugee from the stoners club in junior high' despite being 45 years old. 'It's a little weird,' Shapiro griped. You can see the full segment in the clip below. When did we decide that adults are going to be the new kids? — The Ben Shapiro Show (@BenShapiroShow) May 28, 2025 Bill Burr Flames Ben Shapiro For Calling Him 'Woke' Over Comments About Health Care CEOs Ben Shapiro's Mocking Of Kamala Harris' Hugs Backfires Badly Ben Shapiro Tries --And Fails -- To Insult Tim Walz With Dated Reference
The Guardian
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
The anti-woke warriors used to defend free speech. Now they make McCarthyism look progressive
Thoughts and non-denominational prayers to all the anti-woke warriors out there. It may seem as though everything is going their way now Donald Trump is back with a vengeance, but the poor things have run into a bit of a branding problem. For years, the anti-woke crowd positioned themselves as fearless free thinkers taking on the intolerant left. The journalist Bari Weiss wrote a fawning New York Times piece in 2018 describing rightwing voices such as Ben Shapiro and Candace Owens as 'renegades of the intellectual dark web' (IDW). Now, however, the people who used to position themselves as oppressed truth-tellers operating in what Weiss's article called an 'era of That Which Cannot Be Said', have a state-sanctioned microphone. They've won. But in winning they've made it difficult to continue the charade that they give a damn about 'cancel culture'. Look around: some of these self-styled free speech warriors are doing everything they can to ruin the lives of everyone who doesn't 100% agree with them. Most conservatives don't seem to mind that their hypocrisy is now on full display. But, according to a recent piece on the news site Semafor, a handful of people within the anti-woke media ecosystem are starting to have something of an identity crisis. 'One didn't have to be especially prescient to spot those 'anti-woke' types who would just slowly become Maga flunkies,' said the libertarian journalist Michael Moynihan, who had a short stint at Weiss's publication the Free Press before becoming disillusioned. Remember when the right railed against people losing jobs for old comments they'd made? In 2018, for example, the Atlantic fired the conservative columnist Kevin Williamson after the backlash about a 2014 podcast appearance in which the 60-year-old had suggested women should face hanging for having an abortion. Cue a million furious tweets from the 'renegades of the IDW' about how, as Ben Shapiro put it on X, 'virtually everyone is vulnerable if they run afoul of the Left's interests'. Now, however, there's no denying that virtually everyone is vulnerable if they run afoul of the right's interests. Semafor's piece notes that 'One [Free Press] investigation that exposed two low-profile employees at PBS who had focused on diversity and got them fired rubbed even some of its allies the wrong way'. At least the DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) employees at PBS 'only' got fired. Canary Mission and Betar US, two pro-Israel groups, have been compiling 'deportation' lists of pro-Palestinian activists on college campuses and sharing them with the Trump administration. Betar US has also warned that it is going to expand its focus beyond immigrants to naturalised US citizens. These organisations are just a couple of cogs in a massive dissent-crushing machine. The Christian nationalist Heritage Foundation, which spearheaded Project 2025, is behind a dystopian plan called Project Esther that cynically weaponises very real concerns about antisemitism to shut down criticism of Israel and quash pro-Palestinian activism. And you can bet these censorious projects won't end with Palestinians: at the rate we're going, pro-choice sentiment will soon be considered 'anti-Christian' and anyone espousing it will get deported. If that sounds far-fetched, let me remind you that last month the veterans affairs department ordered staff to report their colleagues for 'anti-Christian bias'. Drunk on their power to deport and defame, some on the right have officially lost the plot. For months a number of conservative voices have been engaged on a mission to cancel Ms Rachel, a children's entertainer whose real name is Rachel Accurso. If you have small children, Ms Rachel needs no introduction. For everyone else, she wears a pink headband and sings songs such as Icky Sticky Bubble Gum. Ms Rachel's videos have always been gently inclusive: she incorporates sign language and she has frequently had Jules Hoffman, a non-binary musician, on her show. On her personal social media she has also advocated for issues such as paid family leave. The right tried to cancel Ms Rachel over Hoffman's gender identity back in 2023. Now they're trying to cancel the beloved star again; this time for the 'crime' of speaking up about Palestinian kids and featuring a three-year-old double amputee from Gaza in a video. The fact Accurso is humanising Palestinian children is driving some rightwing voices so berserk that they're smearing her as antisemitic, asking the US attorney general for an investigation, and spreading the ridiculous and completely baseless lie (which the New York Times bizarrely chose to amplify) that she is being funded by Hamas. Welcome to our 'new era of That Which Cannot Be Said': one that may make McCarthyism seem progressive. It would seem the new renegades of the intellectual dark web are those of us who think you shouldn't bomb starving babies in their sleep just because they are Palestinian. Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist
New York Times
24-05-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
How the Right Has Reshaped the Narrative Around George Floyd
When the world saw the video of George Floyd taking his last breath under the knee of a police officer while onlookers pleaded for his life, the outrage was universal. Republicans and Democrats agreed it was horrific, as did police chiefs and rank-and-file officers, and protesters of every race in towns large and small. 'It is important to recognize that everyone should be on the same side of this,' Ben Shapiro, the prominent conservative commentator, said back then, adding, 'It's police brutality, obviously.' In a televised trial, the officer, Derek Chauvin, was convicted of murder and sentenced to 22.5 years in prison. Five years later, that consensus has disintegrated. The right-wing reshaping of the narrative of that day is in full swing, to the point where Mr. Shapiro is calling on President Trump to pardon Mr. Chauvin. In the right's retelling, Mr. Floyd did not die from being deprived of air, and Mr. Chauvin was railroaded by a country that flew into a panic over race and did not consider the facts soberly. To build this case, conservatives have packaged misleading details from court documents, images of burning and looting during the protests, Mr. Floyd's criminal record and drug use, and legal theories that lawyers say are distorted. Disputing facts that most people once agreed on has become part of a new political playbook, often employed by right-leaning pundits and politicians. But the killing of George Floyd on May 25, 2020 was not just any news story. For conservatives, it was the catalyst for a kind of liberal mania that, some of them assert, led directly to racial hiring quotas, 'woke' curriculums in school and white guilt. 'President Trump's war on wokeness cannot be considered complete unless he addresses the fundamental injustice that started it all,' Mr. Shapiro said in March, in one of five episodes of his show 'Daily Wire' devoted to 'The Case for Derek Chauvin.' Many prominent Trump supporters have joined the defense of Mr. Chauvin, including Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, Charlie Kirk and Christopher Rufo. 'America will not be made whole until we receive justice for Derek Chauvin,' Jack Posobiec, the Trump loyalist and conspiracy theorist, told a cheering audience in December, adding, 'The truth must come out about what happened with George Floyd. It was a lie and it was always a lie.' Mr. Shapiro started an online petition that his spokeswoman says has nearly 80,000 signatures. On X, Elon Musk said a pardon was 'something to think about.' Brian O'Hara, the police chief of Minneapolis, has decried what he called an attempt to rewrite history, saying the goal was to undermine police reform. 'We all knew what we saw, and we all knew it was wrong,' he wrote in an opinion essay in The Minnesota Star-Tribune in February. Misinformation began to circulate immediately following Mr. Floyd's death in 2020. A YouTube video amplified by the conspiracy group QAnon claimed the entire incident had been faked by the deep state, and that Mr. Floyd, who is buried in Texas, was still alive. There were viral social media posts alleging that George Soros, the billionaire who has become a punching bag for the right, was secretly funding the protests, which was not true. As body camera videos and autopsy reports became available, right-wing news sites began to construct a counternarrative of the day of Mr. Floyd's arrest. In these accounts, Mr. Chauvin was a decorated officer who was only following his police training. In fact, he was both honored for some actions and the subject of numerous complaints, and Minneapolis police officials testified that his treatment of Mr. Floyd did not conform to the department's training. Tucker Carlson, the former Fox News commentator, said Mr. Chauvin was railroaded by mob justice that he likened to a Southern lynching. Other accounts suggest Mr. Floyd died not because he was pinned down for so long, but from other causes — a drug overdose, heart disease or maybe even a rare type of tumor. At the trial, medical experts gave conflicting opinions on all three claims. The jury concluded that Mr. Floyd would not have died but for Mr. Chauvin's actions. In December 2024, in response to an attempt by Mr. Chauvin to overturn his conviction, a federal judge granted permission to run tests on medical samples from Mr. Floyd to determine if the tumor contributed to his death. Mr. Shapiro and other right-wing commentators also argue that the jury was under intense pressure to convict, or was predisposed to do so. These accounts purport to reveal the 'real truth' about what happened. They rely heavily on autopsy reports, body camera video and other evidence that have been available for years and were presented to the jury in great detail. Many note the fact that the autopsy found no injury to Mr. Floyd's neck, though medical examiners say that a person's air supply can be cut off with no signs of injury. In an interview, Mr. Shapiro said that he had changed his mind about Mr. Chauvin's guilt while watching the trial, and that he had waited to make a case for a pardon until after Mr. Trump took office. Such a pardon would largely be symbolic. He was convicted of both state and federal crimes, and Mr. Trump has the power to pardon him only for the federal ones. If he did so, Mr. Chauvin would be transferred from federal prison to Minnesota to serve out the rest of his 22.5-year state sentence. In March, Mr. Trump said he was not considering a pardon, but Mr. Shapiro was undaunted. 'Concerned citizens speak out consistently,' Mr. Shapiro told his viewers. 'Eventually, those voices permeate the administration's awareness and influence what makes it onto the president's agenda.' The narrative of the invasion of the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 went through a similar shift. At first, the event was met with bipartisan condemnation. But upon taking office in January, Mr. Trump pardoned the participants in what he called a 'day of love.' Media analysts say that a strategy like Mr. Shapiro's can be effective. 'Repetition and amplification equals truth for our brains, so this is how bad actors can hack the media,' said Esosa Osa, the founder of Onyx Impact, a nonprofit that fights disinformation targeting Black communities. Over the years the machinery of reinvention has cranked on. In 2022, Kanye West, a vocal Trump supporter, attended the premiere of a documentary by a right-wing firebrand, Candace Owens, 'The Greatest Lie Ever Sold: George Floyd and the Rise of BLM.' He said afterward that Mr. Floyd had died of a drug overdose. Another Chauvin defender was Liz Collin, a former Minneapolis news anchor who is married to Robert Kroll, the former head of the Minneapolis police union. Mr. Chauvin's first public comments appeared in Ms. Collin's documentary, 'The Fall of Minneapolis,' released in 2023. He called the trial 'a sham.' In an interview, Ms. Collin said the idea that George Floyd was a victim of racist brutality had caused unnecessary strife. She blamed officials who she said were slow to disclose information, and what she called the media's failure to emphasize elements of the narrative, such as the fact that one of the officers who arrested Mr. Floyd was Black. These gaps, she said, created a 'dangerous and divisive narrative that we're still living with the consequences of to this day.' With the fifth anniversary of Mr. Floyd's murder on Sunday, Minnesota officials have braced for unrest over a potential pardon. And the right and the left have accused each other of using the issue — and massaging the facts — for political advantage. On his podcast, Tim Pool, the conservative influencer, said Democrats were exaggerating the possibility of a pardon to attack Mr. Trump. On the other hand, Larry Krasner, the liberal prosecutor in Philadelphia, warned his Instagram followers that they should not fall into the trap of rioting if Mr. Chauvin is pardoned. 'What they're trying to do is, they're trying to get people in the cities to engage in unrest so they can bring in the military,' he said.
Yahoo
14-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Ben Shapiro Says Trump's Tariff Reversal Wasn't 4D Chess – 'It Was Just People Getting Yippy And Bond Markets Getting Queasy'
Stocks didn't just stumble—they cratered. From April 3 to April 8, the S&P 500 slid 12%, the Nasdaq Composite dropped 13%, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 11% as investors digested President 's sweeping "Liberation Day" tariffs. After the rout, Trump stepped into the White House press briefing room on April 9 and paused most levies for 90 days. One day later, commentator Ben Shapiro told listeners of "The Ben Shapiro Show" that the U‑turn had nothing to do with "4‑D chess." Instead, he said, "it was just people getting yippy and bond markets getting queasy." Don't Miss: Deloitte's fastest-growing software company partners with Amazon, Walmart & Target – Invest where it hurts — and help millions heal:. Trump announced a 10% tariff on some imports and a hefty 145% tariff specifically on Chinese goods during a speech in Washington on April 2. Those headline figures, paired with warnings from economists, fed the week‑long sell‑off Business Insider chronicled, while The Guardian traced the China tariff to the administration's "America First" reset. By April 8, bond traders were in full retreat. The 10‑year Treasury yield jumped to 4.26%, its sharpest three‑day climb since 1982, Reuters reported. Higher yields pushed up borrowing costs and amplified worries that tariff‑driven inflation would hit households already wrestling with rising prices. Trending: How do billionaires pay less in income tax than you?. The Wall Street Journal reported within minutes, futures turned green, and by the closing bell the S&P 500 had rebounded 9.5% while the Nasdaq soared 12.2%. Shapiro replayed Trump's explanation—"people were getting yippy... bond markets getting queasy"—and laughed at claims of hidden strategy. Institutional investors echoed the skepticism. On April 17, PIMCO said recent U.S. trade policies were weakening the dollar's traditional safe-haven appeal, prompting the firm to recommend trimming exposure to long-dated Treasuries in favor of global alternatives. Global institutions also flagged risks. International Monetary Fund Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva said April 3 in a statement that newly announced U.S. tariffs "represent a significant risk to the global outlook at a time of sluggish growth," urging the U.S. and its trading partners to resolve tensions and avoid steps that could "further harm the world economy."Academic models suggest the U.S. economy could face significant domestic costs from the tariffs. According to the Yale Budget Lab, Trump's tariff package— combined with anticipated foreign retaliation — could reduce U.S. real GDP growth by 1.1 percentage points and result in 740,000 fewer payroll jobs by December. Lawmakers sensed an opening. Time reported April 10 that Sen. Adam Schiff (D‑CA) called for an insider‑trading probe to see whether anyone profited from advance knowledge of the pause, a step backed by several House Democrats . Read Next: Nancy Pelosi Invested $5 Million In An AI Company Last Year — 'Scrolling To UBI' — Deloitte's #1 fastest-growing software company allows users to earn money on their phones. Image: Shutterstock UNLOCKED: 5 NEW TRADES EVERY WEEK. Click now to get top trade ideas daily, plus unlimited access to cutting-edge tools and strategies to gain an edge in the markets. Get the latest stock analysis from Benzinga? APPLE (AAPL): Free Stock Analysis Report TESLA (TSLA): Free Stock Analysis Report This article Ben Shapiro Says Trump's Tariff Reversal Wasn't 4D Chess – 'It Was Just People Getting Yippy And Bond Markets Getting Queasy' originally appeared on © 2025 Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.
