[Music] welcome to ear biscuits I’m link and I’m Rhett we do this every single week we have an up close and personal conversation with someone interesting from the internet this week mr. Shane Dawson joins us at the round table of dim lighting we discussed life changing ghost encounters what is like growing up wing twice as much as you do now and how YouTube got him fired among other things it’s a great conversation stay tuned for that but first link I want to just make a request of me or the people of you well I have a goal and since a lot of times we spend a lot of time together if I have a goal then a lot of times you can help me achieve that goal and I think this is gonna be something that you’re also gonna be into is that all I am to you Rhett got accountability someone to help you achieve your goals I feel used yep okay what is it we should go to more concerts I’ve been thinking about this lately I’ve been thinking about the fact that we live in this town where pretty much any band any artist who is anybody is gonna have a date on their tour that’s true they’re gonna come through this town and they’re gonna play music and you can usually you can find out about this before it happens it’s not like the kind of thing it this isn’t the medieval times or just like a troubadour comes in as well waltz here yeah love the trumpet and you just come around yeah we have the internet and Walt is that what you said that’s a very medieval name for this is a very fruit bat or famous medieval performer I am walked anyway it the last concert we went to in this town you remember that Merle Haggard and Kris Kristofferson and I gotta tell you forget it at the Greek theater amazing venue obviously amazing performers life-changing experience for us row third row and then we stayed after the concert and we waited for Merle we stayed out there we had talked with somebody we kind of got in a little bit and we got into the like two fangirls that’s the backstage area but we got into like the the VIP area where the apparently Kris Kristofferson and Merle Haggard were going to come in to at least rumor had it they were gonna come in there after they performed and eat because I mean guys and girls ladies and gentlemen you have to understand that Merle Haggard is he’s not only a musical icon he is a personal icon for us he is like a North Star of being for us I mean he’s not a god I’m not gonna say it kind of sounds like we’re big fans of Merle Haggard I mean I have so many records there’s not a god but we really like him we really loved Merle Haggard and I mean our collective goal in life is to meet him before he dies I mean he’s gonna go some Johnny Cash is gone Waylon Jennings is gone I was not gone I was prepared to pee a little bit among me you know when meeting him what would happen it upon meeting him is where I was trying to say we didn’t meet him he was sick he was feeling under the weather which is not unusual for Merle at this age but I don’t want to wait for marula come back to Los Angeles to see another concert that really wasn’t my point what it wasn’t to reminisce about that it was about the fact that we enjoy music we some people would say our musicians I enjoy a great live show you know we can get a babysitter we can take our wire I’m talking about you know how wives are invited that’s nice if I decided hey I hear about these shows I hear about these bands I hear about these places and I know that there are people actually going to enjoy these things and here we I mean here we are in a room with each other at night and that’s great I enjoy that but I’m saying occasionally we should be going to a concert it’s okay I have two thoughts first it’s a certain special type of person I’ve observed that goes to concerts I mean at a younger age everyone so yeah I’m gonna go to show or whatever you know when we were in college we saw a decent amount of concerts but for an older person someone who’s out of college to go to a concert my observation is that that is a certain type of person that we are not and that’s one a rich person to a person who doesn’t have any thing doesn’t have a lot of kids I think is what it is I mean I think it’s you know you can’t take your kids you have to make it a priority I know there’s people you know that gays price and go to things all that they go to these concerts all the time and it is the commitment I’m not just talking about going to a concert that cost $90 or something I’m just talking about a band that’s playing somewhere live music I will say when the Avett Brothers come to town we should work that out we should go there we big fans there’s we should go and then but I’m not gonna wait afterward like a schoolgirl and try to meet him but if you know them anyone out there knows them personally they’re not a song about my sister-in-law well I’ve heard that a million times look at where that’s gotten us nowhere I’m I’m tired of hearing about it honestly because you can’t work it into an angle for us to meet them I mean let me tell you a little something about the avett brothers and then we’ll move on and talk to Shane Dawson they’re from North Carolina with their fingers they’re from North Carolina and Scott Avett one of the – Ava brothers we kind of had a thing with my wife’s sister in college at East Carolina University and he wrote a song about her pretty girl from Cedar Lane her name’s Ashley she’s the Ashley in the song and we went so you say I know for a fact and we went to the Khan has it gotten us anywhere we went yeah well we went to the concert the New Year’s Eve show this past year and you know where Ashley set she said in a with me in the back row the absolute furthest spot away from the avett brothers so that’s what getting a song written after you because we think it might be inappropriate to try to work that angle that’s all I’m saying but a vet brothers if you’re listening anybody emailed them what do you mean it’s inappropriate you email them I’m bitter about all of you this years ago two years ago I said opposites listen we make Internet videos but enough about that my sister-in-law you wrote a song about her and we want to meet you guys it is kind of a weekend yeah I got it but what make a music video for you guys we will it’ll be awesome I also wanted to see Willie Nelson the Hollywood Bowl I haven’t gone to show at the Holi well I’ll see anybody there it’s pathetic link it’s a while Ritchie is gonna be at the Hollywood Bowl next morally but we’re gonna be out of town in North Carolina when he’s here it’s a world renowned venue so um it’s a bowl it’s a bowl well of course it is that’s why it’s called Hollywood Bowl okay this week we talked to Shane Dawson you know him from his very popular YouTube channel Shane Dawson TV’s been around since 2008 he’s got just under five minimum a million subscribers on that channel on his second channel which is youtube.com slash Shane his vlog channel he’s got under just under three million subscribers over there and he just launched I mean I guess it’s been a couple of months now his own audio podcast called Shane and Friends which is doing really well not not come knock not a competitive podcast though we’re not in competition with it don’t get discouraged don’t get discouraged your biscuits is not in direct competition with Shane your friends because if it was we would lose I think that’s my point of trying make myself feel better it’s just a different thing we sit down with Shane here it is convo it up so let’s start this off right you had ghosts in your house still do and you’re selling it well I’m not selling it because of that that was definitely a reason but something I left off the you know like buy this house card did write free ghosts yeah my grandma’s here no so I my grandma died and I never ever believed in ghosts ever and she died in the house no she I don’t know where she died I don’t know Long Beach she’s even worse so she died back in Long Beach and you know I was really really close to her and one night I was laying in bed you know watching friends or something and I look over at the closet and she was standing there and I’ve never you know I’m not into all that weird go so it freaked me out I ran out of my room I threw up in the hallway I was like hyperventilating my brother ran in and my brother out of nowhere cuz he’s not into that stuff either he goes did you see grandma and I said what how do you know that he’s like cuz I heard her voice he’s like 28 so we both are like little girls screaming and crying my mom runs up and my mom who’s like Christian but not into ghosts either she stops us and she goes I know what happened cuz I can feel it and calm down it’s just grandma we’re like it’s just grandma she’s dead so we go back to my closet and I look and when she died I didn’t take any of her like valuables but I took this one robe that she used to wear everyday because I’m creepy as hell so I took her rope and it was hanging in my closet and that’s right where I saw her yeah it was creepy as hell how long ago was this this was about two years ago and then I stopped sleeping in that room I created a bedroom in my garage I had a converted and I slept in my grudge for the next year you let grandma have your bedroom I was like you can have it grandpa I Robot you can have the robe you can have it all um and then I went to my sorry I’m going I’m talking too much about this is no rabies no no this is interesting probably not true but interesting so then I was having a lot of really weird experiences in that house so my girlfriend’s mom’s friend is like a medium who has like salt crimes and she’s you know done all that stuff okay this is Lisa we know Lisa Lisa Lisa’s mom’s friend is a medium okay and which you know I thought was stupid and shady but I looked her up and she’s like legit found dead bodies and like solve crimes and like has done a lot of good things I’m like okay let me go see her I didn’t tell her anything I sat down with her and she goes your grandma standing right next to you described my grandma said her name did all this stuff what had Lisa told her before you go through nothing I told her not to she’s like no I won’t because you know I want her to be honest or whatever and she just grabbed my grandma and goes your grandma tried to reach you in your closet and I’m like yes and she goes she was trying to tell you when she went into what she was trying to tell me and then she goes no you keep you’d rather not tell us because what was the nature of it oh the long story what’s the specific long story short is I was working a little bit too hard and was leading toward a breakdown which is true and luckily I listened to that advice and I didn’t have a breakdown but you know how it is with YouTube and all these things you’re doing a million things sure and you where’s self-doubt oh yeah so that happened and I was like okay I get it thanks grandma but she also said tell your mom that your grandma wants to tell her to get rid of all your grandma stuff because my mom started putting my grandma all over the house was a little strange and and my grandma and she’s the medium said your grandma thinks your mom is making a shrine of her and that’s not healthy and she needs to get rid of the shrine so she can move on I go home and I said mom and not I’m not lying my mom goes and my mom goes Shane I just had this weird feeling and I look over there’s a box of stuff I’m like what’s going on she’s like something just told me to like start taking down grandmas things like it’s almost like I have a shrine of her her serious words I started bawling I called Lisa I’m like oh my god your mom’s friends been real I like it got really scary my mom started crying we had this whole thing and I’m like okay we I think I’m going to get my mom into her own little house I think I’m gonna sell this house so it definitely was part of the reason I need to get some stress off of my back so even though you received guidance from your grandmother you said I’m still still good now we’re still getting out of this house part of the reason though was because the house was a huge load of stress you know I bought a big house and that was not I mean it was smart but it also was like you know huge monkey on my back you know it’s huge house that my mom is living that I’m filming and that my all my dead grandma stuff is in that it’s like it was I needed it clear some so it wasn’t just grandma that said but she is part of the reason that I decided to finally sell it because I wasn’t going to and after that I was like I think grandma’s telling me to sell this house did she show up again or just that one time no she never showed up again one good one-time deal one time that’s all it took she got her point across it sounds like I mean but you know it’s funny because I I still am very weary of when people say goodbay believe in all this stuff but I mean it legit happened and it was real it was really terrifying to see a dead person standing in front of you well let’s go back even earlier than two years ago okay when grandma in the closet and go to Grandma in real life we you know living grandma yeah right where you from where’d you grow up Long Beach Oh LD say where’s your grandmother Danny uh and Cameron Diaz and Snoop Dogg those are the only people oh and the woman from Reno 911 one lives there really Wendy something yeah and if you go to Long Beach’s Wikipedia page we are there how often do you go back to Long Beach never you don’t miss it well it’s not that far first of all it is it’s not but it is it’s far enough that you would have to decide to go back there’s no reason to go back is what you’re saying it’s the worst drive ever for so maybe since we’ve been there for a couple of things he your son had a dive meet in Long Beach you did uh-huh and that’s what that’s the one time I went that was it not too great not too bad one there’s a wharf down there right what I call it way away like a wharf like a big pier and I don’t mean like a dog making it I got excited cuz I thought you meant like dwarf which is I mean incorrect there’s a dwarf hybrid there a whale hybrid down there is called the wharf there is a rumored dwarf town have you heard about this in Long Beach yes hey you all you’ve heard about midget this is so sorry little people found midget tone you’ve heard about just give it to a straight okay midget town have you heard about that no no but I want to is it within Long Beach here’s the thing I think every town has this rumor obviously your guyses didn’t but midget town for those listening maybe they’ve heard is supposedly there’s a town in every town we’re just little people living all the houses are small everybody has a story like yeah me my friends were there one night we got drunk and we hit a midget with our car like everybody has a midget town story mm-hmm but there is actually a midget town in Long Beach and that’s why the stories got created are there signs yeah it’s called short Beach probably shouldn’t I said is there something I have not been there but it’s very very gated so it’s not around it’s not around anymore okay what it was was when they were filming was heard of Oz I have so many weird facts I’m sorry oh no I have heard about this yes yes on NPR they talked about all the munchkins at the time they were filming yeah live there and you you know they stick together they bought a bunch of little places and you know how do much a little house is and and houses are still there how I think the houses are still there but there’s I don’t think anybody’s living there we talked to the security guard and like a bunch of people around the area and they were all very like casual about like oh yeah that was a you know historical place blah blah blah I’m like oh so it’s real alright so give us some of the details of growing up in Long Beach well besides our endless searches for a midget town um oh god I I don’t even know I grew up with both your parents your grandma how did this work no okay so I grew my dad left kind of left I don’t know what he left I guess that’s a word for it when I was about nine and then I lived with my mom and my grandma v grandma the grandma okay got it brothers and sisters my brother two brothers yes – sometimes I just forget family that sounds terrible you forget how many brothers you have no just family and God yes two brothers there’s so many pictures I mean thank that other the other brother he’s in pictures I’ve never met him no but I was looking through pictures the other day when cuz we’re you know we’re moving we’re cleaning and I saw this picture of me my brother and some little girl Mike who the hell is that my mom’s like oh we had a daughter for a while I’m like what do you mean you had a daughter for a while she’s like well we it just didn’t work out I’m like that doesn’t make any sense yeah can you explain like a foster kid I think what it was is my mom couldn’t physically she always wanted a daughter and she kept having sons and I think at some point she’s like physically this isn’t gonna happen so I’m gonna get a daughter and I think through a church she started adopting one but I think something bad happened with the daughter maybe she was possessed I don’t know but it didn’t work out huh I think the original parents took her back it was some weird sounds like a foster situation lifetime it’s right but you have two brothers we’re going on record you grew up with two brothers one of them was very absent so but so I really grew up with one okay okay I think I’ve met that brother the absent one no no I’m like where where I haven’t seen them in so long but it wasn’t the one that you stay in touch with I just be in touch with both but you bet yeah I think you guys met the UH the one I grew up with right Jared Jared okay so so what was it like you and Jared grown up with your mom and grandma it was rough well oh yeah we were very messed up kids cuz you know we had such a messed-up upbringing so we were constantly trying to find attention and love and we were going nuts we would wrestle and literally he threw me through a glass door one time it didn’t hurt I was 400 pounds by the way I think I missed that but he threw me through a glass door we would get into these crazy fights the cops would be called out as sometimes we’d get kicked out of churches in restaurants we were very looking for attention when we were about you know at nine ten years old so at nine years old your brother threw the 400-pound you through a glass door here’s the thing though it was an accident kind of we were really into wrestling at the time and he was trying to do like this Undertaker move oh yeah and it just didn’t just he covered me in blankets so I was okay but the move was he put me in blankets on a chair and then he would run toward the chair and he was trying with his arm and he was trying to knock me out but then he missed and I just flew through the glass I can understand that Zach West piledrive me in front of his grandma when we were in middle school and I never went to his house again I was terribly embarrassed it was it was pretty painful too you know but mostly it was it was an ego pain yeah with the grandma laughing and everything but there was no punching did your brother ever punch you no we loved each other so much but we were I don’t know we we both have very high pain thresholds I don’t ever really feel pain I’m sounding so weird in this interview but it’s fine I’m gonna go with it yeah like I just got a I just got an ear surgery and it was supposed to doctors like you’re gonna be out for three days like it’s gonna be the most pain you’ve ever had you’re gonna vomit I had Lisa with me and she’s holding my hand I’m crying I’m nervous he did the whole thing and I didn’t even know he did it he’s like oh well you have hype like you didn’t feel that at all you have no feelings what was the surgery for Oh God I had this intense ear infection and they had to drain my ear and poke holes in it and put a tube in there and do a bunch of weird stuff cut things out you got a tube in there right now I think it fell out it dissolves yeah it falls out oh okay hey you might need to make another appointment okay that’s not supposed to have traditions dictate that you’re supposed to eat it when it falls out good luck yeah okay all right there’s like a mother eating the placenta which is also good luck no and it’s for I mean it’s becoming like the in thing out here in California I’m not kidding okay so now you’re sounding weirder than me so this is good no I’m just so sick I guess I said that to ask now did your mom eat the placenta after you were born because that is kind of a thing no I’m not kidding they dry it out and they put it in tea and stuff no I used to be very helpful I did poop in the placenta bag and it almost killed my mother because that could kill you yeah yeah yeah okay so she didn’t eat it now you said it how much did you say you weight as a kid I mean how much do you weigh now you’re like I’m like 175 now and you said you weight how much my highest was I don’t know exact number my scale only went up to 350 and I was always at error but I lost a bunch of weight and then I was at 350 so I was probably at highest 400 and this is you’re talking like from a young age like nine years old or younger I mean I was always huge but I probably was around 400 when I was like 14 okay and you said that things were messed up for you as a kid you’re talking about as a result of your dad not being there or does something happen or what um I mean I don’t want to bring the mood to down no you want me to bring it down yeah we just want you to talk to us yeah we can turn the lights out a little bit it’s fine you’re gonna get tears no you’re not I’ve no feelings no so my dad was not a happy man so he was not that friendly toward us and loved the drinks phone um and and yeah so he ended up leaving us for my Spanish teacher slash mom’s best friend Oh know who’s really cool I loved her like a Mad Men situation yeah it was intense and it’s funny because when I was a kid I didn’t really get the full story until now I look back I’m like oh wow that was weird and a lot but yeah so he left we were all very excited when he left because you know he was abusive and stuff so then me and my mom my brother we lost everything because he took everything so we like lost our house and we were almost living in our car one point and out of nowhere our dentist was like oh you could rent my old house for you know a fourth of the price that I usually we rented out so we were really lucky and blessed with that so my mom started working she had never had a job before she you know she started working at like Macy’s or something and and we got our lives back together and it was your dad completely out of the picture at that point there was no like visitation or no no I saw him once in a while but but he wasn’t paying child support he wasn’t helping with anything I think it was it was very Oh yuck he was terrible and that all happened in the middle school years that was from nine to about God I mean from 9 to 18 really but did all the bad probably from like 9 to 13 okay and so didn’t you that’s a really bad age for those bad things to be happening I would imagine food was great loved food obviously so so food was a coping mechanism for you at that time food was definitely you know my my brother Jared I’m sure he’s fine with me going into this because he’s turned his life around but he got into drugs and my other brother got very into drugs to a point where we didn’t see him and I just loved food and the bad thing is they always say they always make excuses I go poor people you know I’m sorry what is the excuse well the excuses like oh it’s so expensive to eat healthy it’s like no that’s true it’s way too expensive to eat healthy it was really cheap to eat cans and cans of refried beans and in government cheese that’s what was cheap for us right so I just got really big but you know what I held it well I never looked 400 I looked like 250 so I was impressive I was lucky you still had some mean wrastlin moves so many rats I was really good at knocking my brother out who was going through the door just going through the door but yeah yeah so I got really fat I’m sorry what was the question childhood I was fat what did I eat I don’t know what else well so so at that age you said going in at a 14 basically transition between middle school and high school you go to a public school in Long Beach so when when my dad was around we went to a Catholic school private school oddly enough he was very high up in the church at the time we were seven race to go Cardinal we were like seven seven well so we went to a Catholic school but the Christian Church which was like the biggest Church in Long Beach by Calvary Chapel or one of those he was like the head guy their minister I don’t know and we were all very up in that church we went to a Catholic school which I was always very confused about so when all that went down we got kicked out of the school and it was like a big controversy so I had to go to public school which I was excited about because you know private schools terrible and yeah and I went to public school for the rest of of school and we were pretty broke forever up until like I was 19 maybe right you know right when I think long beach public high school I think like typical California and a movie high school am I wrong about this well unless you’re thinking of like mmm like say the last dance high school I can’t say for sure cuz I haven’t seen it but the word beach is in the town so I’m just eating on a surfboard like learning math on the key I don’t I mean all schools are cliquey but I just have this like California high school there’s the cool kids there’s the jocks there’s the beach guys there’s the Hispanic kids so Long Beach is cut into two slices one half is like lesbians and like old retired why people which is this nicest half that’s like Sherman what’s it called Belmont Shore that’s where they film Dexter because it looks like Miami like that’s the cool there’s an aquarium there which I was a I was a security guard for the octopus at one point we’ll get to that way yeah yeah we will get to that like okay go ahead but then there’s the other half of Long Beach which is where I grew up which is just like all the black kids which explains a lot about me all the Mexicans I was one of the only white people there and yeah so I was definitely on that side of Long Beach closer to Lakewood which does not have a lake and they did at one point probably ed woods – yeah so yeah I was I was in that that area of Long Beach so my mic crowd was um all black people and and this sounds racist and whatever I guess it’s going to but I had I definitely got picked on a lot being a 400-pound white lesbian looking boy I had to form a sense of humor and I and I really took from the black culture and I started creating jokes out of the movies they were watching the music they were listening to all this stuff so my humor is very very black and it still is pretty black so I’m good but you had I mean you said that you were made fun of but you had legitimate friends who were are you saying your friends made fun of you or everyone else but you had your friends who were black people who taught you what was funny no I didn’t really have friends I had like one friend every year and they were all so I mean I had a friend who was like in a wheelchair and like I mean let’s just say god I don’t want to say retarded I’ve already said midget Oh Lord whatever I had a retarded friend I was I was the president of Best Buddies which is a program in school where you befriend a retarded person and you take to the movies and you like go to Disneyland with them and I was the president I know I’m a giver after her Francis we’re friends on Facebook shut up every year Francis every year I had a friend who definitely was like and somebody who needed me no I guess I was trying to like fix people and help people or whatever and around but I mean Paul’s because that’s pretty and that is pretty remarkable I mean I remember what we were like in that age and not that we were you know I’m not gonna say that we were the kind of guys that were gonna you know point out somebody who has some challenges it make fun of them but then we I was definitely not the kind of guy that was like oh but I’m also going to befriend this person much less be the president of the best is the best buddies clubs buddies but I’m still kicking I mean that’s I think that says a lot about who you were who you are mm-hmm well you know when you have no control at home you and you you can’t really get anything together at home you can’t like being what’s the word for you can’t really help anybody because you’re the youngest kid and you can’t really do much you can’t get money for your mom you can’t do anything so when you go to school and you see like these special kids who have no friends and you see this thing you’re like oh I can help these people you know I I don’t have money but I can I have time and I could hang out with these kids and like they’re just as bored and lonely as I am and I did a lot of stuff like that from like sixth grade to ninth grade a lot of like you know community service type of stuff just because you know better than sitting at home and eating well not as great but but you were finding at the time that you know being funny mm-hmm was and they were the best audience it was a way to deal with this insecurity it was a way to deal with being a target essentially hmm how it happened do you remember a specific moment where was like oh this works yeah I started drama class at the beginning of high school and and there was one skit and I went to the teacher and I said oh can I write my own skit and he’s like okay so I did one where I played like a gangster character and I played a couple characters and I did it in front of like you know my class and they loved it and the next day they’re like do it in front of the whole school during this assembly and I’m like oh okay and I did it for the whole school and I mean it was nuts every person that auditorium was standing up at the end of it freaking out I read it I read the skit back a couple years ago this is terrible but in high school they loved it and that really turned everything around and that’s when I was like oh I could actually you know do something funny and people will laugh and that’s when I started making videos and so used to you’re talking about starting youtube at that time YouTube wasn’t around this was like 2003 2004 so I just making videos for class projects okay that was part tenth grade and I would make these crazy raunchy you know class projects and of course the teacher was like shut and locked the door so the principal didn’t come in and we watch them and laughing we made crazy raunchy videos that your teacher okay we did yeah pacifically what well like an economics class we had to do something about dictatorship so I did a bra I did a short film I guess about me about my little group and the whole world ends and now me and my little group are in charge of the whole world so I’m like oh god I don’t know how to be the president let me read some books so I read like a Hitler book and I’m like this guy’s awesome so then I come back and I you know I look like Hitler and I’m you know making people do all these crazy things and we you know we there was an Asian girl in our group and she was eating all the animals like it was very very offensive is this on VHS somewhere it’s on YouTube some I think one of my teachers uploaded it what yeah and it’s a lot of views and it’s flagged which is like I’m gonna monetize this what is it called Hitler High School and did it did pretty well but but yeah so the teachers were passed around my videos to all the other teachers and it was like this big thing and and yeah that was before YouTube and I did that like for project so you went viral amongst two teachers at your high school it was very weird yeah and once in a while like they take me aside and be like saw your Hitler High School video funny I was like you see what see I think that’s that’s one of the differences between the long beach experience and then the harness central experience and we wouldn’t have gotten very far with the Hitler High School now would have been shut down real fast we made some racially insensitive videos involving American Indians and we did in middle school I remember that well you did a horrible impression what I actually know it’s time to come clean about two things that are very relevant to this conversation the first thing is if you do not recall you played a mentally handicapped person in that video that we made for class yes I did you did and I play a Native American at some point you don’t plan and the cameras rolling and you just you go into the first care and make a choice but yeah in your defense I will say that we had read Of Mice and Men and we thought that this was going to be a tasteful portrayal of a mentally handicapped person it wasn’t like it wasn’t so much so hey let’s do this it’ll be funny you play a mentally handicapped person and I’ll play a Native American defending his land but because we were trying to be funny it ended up being funny and definitely very insensitive and there is no record of it and it will never make it on the Internet yeah none of the teachers are going to monetize our well it’s just the age is the age difference it’s just the fact that were that much older that they’re you know those teachers are dead now well between YouTube starting just give me a give me a we need to graduate from high school just to get an idea graduated in oh six okay so that was the same time that YouTube large yeah so make some connection there between making videos that go viral with your teachers to putting videos on the internet what what are the specifics there so I started putting up you know meet my friends right after high school right after we graduated I decided I was going to lose weight because I was tired of being you know the funny fat guy and I wanted to be a director and an actor and I wanted to not just be Chris Farley cuz you know how that turned out so he died he died for children he died he had already died he had already died got it yeah so um so I but you haven’t seen him since no she’s good don’t put a jacket up in your closet oh I’ve so many small – I don’t have any small ones luckily so you wanted to lose weight lost weight so that that first year after high school I was making videos with my friends putting them up on YouTube nobody was watching and during that time I lost 200 pounds so one question was this this your current channel or was it another channel now this was like Shane yeah it’s not there anymore I don’t even remember deleting it but it’s gone okay yeah and then in the in the process of this you lost how much I’m bad at math about I’m like 175 my Lois was like 165 and I think my highest was 400 so over 200 pounds yeah inhale and what period of time a year how does that even safe you know what for guys it’s okay so I lost it on Jenny Craig for the most part and then I actually started working for Jenny Craig about halfway through my weight loss because I needed a job and I would start seeing like I would notice guys lose weight so fast I had one guy loose like 300 pounds in a year it was insane women this is once you started working there yeah so okay I know how Weight Watchers works that like has point totals you just basically manage your calories Jenny Craig is that the same thing or is that drinking shakes Jenny Craig oh I wish no Jenny Craig is like eating Lean Cuisines and then having to talk to somebody for an hour a week about it it’s like the prepackaged meals are sent to your house right no you have to go in it’s like going to the grocery store and talking to the clerk about your problems there’s a store got a counselor basically we’re gonna count someone that held you accountable yes counseled you a chubby buddy but there’s a place to go and buy the food yeah so you go there and it looks like a doctor’s office from the 80s it’s the worst place ever there’s pictures of d-list celebrities everywhere and you walk in you sit down with your chubby buddy they weigh you they tell you how much weight you lost and then they order your food and say what do you want this week and you buy a bunch of food which is all very expensive and there’s a freezer room in the back they bring it out in bags and you leave and this still goes on yeah so you were going in there and you were seeing results I mean you were losing all types of weight and you decided to get a job with them well I couldn’t afford the food anymore so about halfway through my weight loss like I my mom was trying so hard I was working on these random jobs security guard and octopus who are you guarding docked if I was from the people I yes vice versa he was the ninth and tenth arm that was good guiding the octopus children really liked to get in there and touch time to push and you can’t do that so I would like hold their ankles so yeah all day I would tell them no touching the octopus that was my Gordon but help me get Jenny Craig food and then about halfway through I lost that job well they just the octopus they didn’t need me I mean let’s be honest the octopus yeah the octopus the octopus so you applied for a job yeah because you get your food for cheap like half off or something and yeah I became a chubby buddy and then over that what did you do specifically so I would I started out as just a counselor which is just like somebody would come in I’d sit down with them they talk about their week I’d give them advice and then send them on their way and I was really really good at it and literally in like the first couple weeks they promoted me from councillor to manager I’m a hard worker the CEO loved me promoted me to manager and I was now managing all these people that have worked there for 20 years I had work there for two weeks I was the biggest sales person in the country at one point I’m really good at selling Jenny chests about a Long Beach know the country I mean I know but you were getting out of Long Beach oh yeah yeah yeah you get a plaque or something no I well this is where this sorry I feel like I keep steamrolling but so long story short I worked the Jenny Craig I was doing really well and I made a video at work I’ve heard we’ve we’ve heard of this I want to hear it from you okay and at this point you were like the top salesman in the country for Jenny Craig I was the shitty Craig not in real life wasn’t really making any money but I was they would actually send me to struggling other Jenny Craig centers to like it was like a really Hilary Swank Lifetime movie like across the country no no like Orange County LA okay I would go to like the Downtown Fullerton and I would be the manager there for like a month and like you know make everybody work together and make the people love everybody and sell a bunch of food and then they’d fly me away to another terrible place to work for a month and they did that because I was really good and I would turn these places around and what do you what was it about you I mean what was your secret okay I had the before and after thing which was which was you know really great to show people although embarrassing because you’d be like this is my before and after picture and they’d be like how’d you get that big oh my god when did you eat so that was like a daily constant reminder of my choices but I have this speech because Jenny Craig is very expensive so the whole thing is you have to sell the program to these people who don’t really have the money and you have to figure out how to get the money so I came up with this speech I was like okay listen so for example say you need to lose weight so and but be very hesitant to buy it ready okay so the program is um it’s a really great it’s a year long it’s and yeah but I you know I mean I’m just minimum wage man listen so am I you saw my before and after picture I didn’t even have a job at that point I was struggling check check but think about it this way and I’ll go into the speech and say you know like look at your car for example say right now your car totally broke down your tires fell off your engine just blew up I don’t know anything about cars but all that everything goes wrong with the car and they give you a bill and say hey it’s $5,000 to fix your car you’re gonna find the money you’re gonna split it between cards are gonna call your mom you’re gonna do whatever you can to get that car done because you need that car this is your body yeah your body a lot more than you need a car hmm and then they cry and be like oh my gosh you’re so right and they’d sign it so at what point would you mention the octopus and then I’d say I used to work in an aquarium if you really need money I left there’s an opening job there’s an opening of the aquarium okay tonight tell us about the video then so then okay another long story short Valerie Bertinelli who was the spokesperson at the time nobody listening knows she knows who she is probably what show was she on in the 80s one day one day at a time yeah the only reason I know that’s cuz the book was called like one pound at a time right yeah terrible pun yeah so Jenny Craig was like oh give this to all of your new clients did you ever meet Jenny no she sold the company to Nestle chocolate before I started working there which is of course she did little ironic I mean when she did sell though all the foods slowly turn chocolate which was very weird like clients would be like why are these chips chocolate what is male and I’m everything just slowly turned spaghetti all the yeah all the protein was chocolate so no I never met her but but yeah so her people were like oh get about these Valerie Bertinelli biography style your clients for free and I’m like okay so I you know we were right next to Leisure World which is like old folks Disneyland it’s all the old people lived there it’s like a big community of old people all my clients were like 80 so I gave the book to them they’re all excited to come back the next week and be like did you read this book before he gave it to me and I’m like no I don’t read so I looked through the book and I was just like oh my god every chapter I mean chapter one cocaine a hell of a drug chapter two who was that like every chapter was intense she was like a child star from the 80s and she had done all this stuff so I thought it’d be funny is if if I had some consultants and some old clients read passages from the book very seriously with music and lighting and it was really really funny and I put it up and literally the next day because you had been making videos just on your own like stupid vlogs this was shanedawsontv my my my now channel so I was making very like simple vlogs this was my third video and what was your expectation and putting it up nothing I was just like oh I cut my hair and I lost some weight I’ll make a new channel because my other channel I look like Rosie O’Donnell so I need to rebrand myself I guess and the third one was this this one customers of Jenny Craig Craig I want to say Craig because there’s an AI ya know it sounds good customers reading excerpts from Valerie Bertinelli’s autobiography which was really juicy really really really juicy and I got a week not I didn’t get a phone call okay another long story short my brother and my mom were working there as well as a family affair I let him all in so we’re all at work and we’re all like talking about the video like it wasn’t that fun yesterday only that’s so funny it has ten views isn’t that awesome and then boom bust through the door all these CEOs from Jenny Craig like hardcore terrifying looking CEOs lots of pantsuits and they they grabbed me took me to like the office shut the door and read me my rights kind of thing and we’re like sign that paper and you’re out and I was like wait what and they were doing it to everybody in separate offices so then we all ended up in the parking lot everybody made your brother in your mom my brother and my mom and five other people that worked there some who would work there for 25 years oh you’re kidding it was bad and we were on the parking lot and everybody’s like what’s going on oh my god and the CEO walked out again there that you can’t ever be here ever you need to leave but you we will send your stuff in the mail you need to leave like it was like we had committed a crime my mom had our hands behind her back at one point like handcuffs not handcuffs but like they were as they were walking her out they like acted like they handcuffed her I think they were literally in front of clients walking her out like a criminal I was like but my before and after pictures in there so much for being the top salesman I know they didn’t care is this video still up you know somebody reuploaded it though so it’s up now and what’s it called I don’t know what they called it it was probably like Shane’s deleted Jenny Craig video or something okay but how long was it up before their you know the first hand views like nothing yeah like 10 views it was crazy nobody watched it I guess so somebody at Jenny Craig watched her maybe yeah you had to be somebody on the inside if you weren’t popular well here’s it there was one woman working there who didn’t get fired who hated me because that was good her she had been there for 20 years and she was never promoted she hated me and yeah I think she ratted us out for sure bitch okay so you lost your job well and along with some other people then what then I I’m not gonna lie I had a very serious depression for like a while I mean you know it caused everybody to lose their jobs a lot of guilt my mom me and my brother were all on unemployment we were trying to find jobs and um I tried to be a security guard again they didn’t want me so I’m but literally a week later I think I got a phone call from YouTube being like hey do you want to be a partner and I was like what and it was so early on and um and yeah that gave me hope of course I got turned down from being a partner because I didn’t have enough videos or something but I was like you know what if I could make more videos and really put my heart and energy into this while on unemployment maybe soon I could make this a job and it happened like a few months later I got partnered and what you’re we don’t know like oh wait wait okay mm-hmm so I mean so you must have had more videos that gave them cause to contact you for the revenue share I think at the time you know what it was I made a video the day I got fired called YouTube got me fired and that one did well because of the title maybe I think it got like maybe like five thousand views in a day which for me back then was a lot you were just telling the story mm-hmm and I was like kind of crying in it but not really and I was like upset about it I was wearing a terrible ill-fitting vest it was all very Jonas Brothers and and that one got a lot of attention in the little YouTube community at the time and I think that’s what they saw I think that was like my maybe fourth video okay but then they wouldn’t let you in because you didn’t have enough videos and but then a few months later you were making more videos were you gaining traction yeah I went from you know I had like 5,000 pieces on that video and then I started getting you know like 50,000 views and then I think by the time I got partnered I was getting like a hundred thousand views of video what were the videos I started doing I think about YouTube back then and I’m sure obviously you guys know this at the time there wasn’t that many people talking directly to the audience and like engaging being like hey guys what do you think about this topic and I’d have a sketch and then I’d asked them what they think about the topic and I created like this cool group of kids who felt very like they didn’t fit in very much like I felt and they’re their age and it was word of mouth I mean it grew like I think it probably had maybe a hundred thousand subscribers in like I don’t know a few months or something like so it was a sketch what I mean what we’ve grown to expect from your channel it was a kind of a sketch thing that then would have a sincere vlog conversation with your audience tacked on to the end of it yeah and like back then I didn’t I didn’t do it – well I always wanted to have a moral at the end of the video cuz I you know it’s how I grew up I always wanted to help people out and have a moral and I mean I watch some of the older videos and I’m like wow that sounded terrible because I would have this crazy crazy video with sex and drugs and all this stuff and then at the end I’d be like guys I don’t drink and you shouldn’t drink either it’s so bad so public service announcement I wasn’t subtle at all but that was my goal was to like spread do like after-school specials on crack that was my goal yeah it’s interesting that I imagine a lot of people I mean even my first impression was this guy will say anything he’s thinking and oh my gosh the kids who are listening to this I’ll listen to the language or the topics that he’s talking about and and then at the end he’s doing this thing where it’s kind of like flipping it around it’s but I guess I was missing the point and not seeing where you were coming from even now as I appreciate your story that it was I mean it was even very calculated you said you weren’t good at it but what would you say or what was your experience I guess dealing with those people all along who would just react to the content upfront and not really see what you were trying to do I ignored it because I knew what I was doing and I you know when I was a kid I grew up on horror movies not horror movie horror horror horror horror movies I grew up that’s all I watched it’s all I knew I still that’s all I watched really so I have had it was so desensitized to violence and cussing and boobs and all of that stuff so for me I wanted to be genuine and authentic with what I thought was funny what I thought was cool and I was into dark humor and all that stuff and I was like maybe there’s other kids out there that are like that too and when YouTube first started it was those kids now it’s a little more mainstream but back then it was like the dark gothic kids at school and that’s what they thought was funny too and my first one of my first sketches was about phone sex where I had phone sex with a girl and she ended up like killing somebody I don’t know it was very dark and and yeah like and that’s just what I knew and then the moral was phone sex kills yeah the moral was there’s always youth if you think your life is bad there’s always somebody out there whose life is worse than yours and you should appreciate what you have it was always like the morals were very very loosely tied to it but um I mean has your has your mission so to speak remain the same you know here we are 2013 and we we all know that YouTube has changed dramatically it’s so you know for guys like you it’s it’s a it’s a business I mean this is what you do this is what you’re going to do for the foreseeable future you’re an entertainer now full-time entertainer how has the approach changed in terms of are you still trying to get those morals across or I still do once in a while but for the most part because YouTube is now so mainstream and it’s not just to press kids it’s like everybody’s watching YouTube so I don’t want to hammer in morals every week because it gets a little like preachy but for like once a month I’ll do a moral but but my whole thing now is I look at it like okay now my goal is just to give five minutes of entertainment to somebody who needs it and if there’s moral great if there’s not at least I got five minutes of free entertainment and and then hopefully now just keep proving people like oh I can actually direct because my goal now which has been my goal since I was five is to direct so now I’m not really in my videos anymore and all my last like hit videos I guess so hard nowadays to get a hit but like my last couple like good videos I haven’t even been in like my last couple parodies I wasn’t even in mmm just behind the scenes writing directing so that’s kind of my goal now is to take a little step back yeah and you know we’ve seen both of your recent Miley parodies which it when I saw your that we can’t stop parody I was like call my wife and I was like you’ve got we’ve got to watch this because we because we had just watched her video and I was like I was just like Seamus which was full of morals totally I mean I did I love the way that you just totally called her caught her out and just kind of just you know you just taught you just told the truth about this situation and who is the who’s the girl that plays Miley and her name is Kristen Finlay and she I’ve known her the fine brothers introduced me to her like six years ago or something five years ago maybe she is a genius she’s the funniest person I’ve ever met and she is one of the best actresses I’ve ever ever worked with it’s not even directing I mean she just does it I just film it like that’s she’s so good yeah they were great I think one of the things I’m interested in and we’ll wrap up here in a little bit but I’m definitely interested in the being you know the the shame that was the overweight kid in high school that was struggling with making friends so definitely not the popular kid to all of a sudden being the Shane Dawson that we all know right we go to VidCon and I remember the first VidCon it there was just talk about how you couldn’t get from one side of the room to the other and that you had to have security I was like yeah that’s I mean I for embarrassing way you you know from what you came from to that well you have to have security when going into a conference and then after every everyone lines up for your autograph what is that like for you it’s weird it never I’ve never been I’ve never felt like empowered by it I’ve never been like excited about getting recognized or like I’ve never had like random meet like you know as you’ll see youtubers like let’s have a meet up guys cuz you know it’s like an ego boost it’s validation I’ve never had that where I need that but I almost but I’m also not uncomfortable with it it’s like when I will go to VidCon all the kids are there our relationship is very much like friends like they come right up to me that give me a hug could tell me like their sad story and then we hug it out take a picture and they’re gone it’s very like the way I would treat a friend tell them Saul my sad stories and then leave where is like you see a nowadays YouTube is changing jour like you see it the British youtubers walk in and it’s very like super star like kids don’t want to go up to them they’re scared they like taking pictures from far away it’s it’s like the way you would treat a real celebrity so but my audience is still very like friends so it’s just felt like I have a lot of friends which is definitely different for me right but also people who know me sometimes better than my real friends know me so I’m never nervous or shy or uncomfortable what do you I mean do you you know be being somebody who struggled to make friends and you know it was being made fun of and now being somebody who you’ve got all these friends I mean you you see the fans as friends and I totally understand that we thats definitely it’s very very different the relationship between a YouTube celebrity and a fan is much different than any traditional celebrity but how do you think that’s impacted you know do you do you find any sort of security in that now you know I as an example you know I came home the other night and my wife I had a really hard day and I said something I can’t remember what I said I said something an insensitive that kind of just started an argument and she she mentioned she said I you know I’ve been here with your two sons all day who have not been appreciating me and what I’ve been doing for them you’ve been out there being a youtuber with all these through these thousands of people who appreciate you of course there’s the haters but then there’s the people who appreciate what you do and I kind of it kind of hit me it’s like yeah you know it is true that you know once you get to a certain level on YouTube it’s kind of like you’re a you’re some you’re someone who does something like if it’s good mythical morning it’s every single day it’s a video every once in a while people appreciate it you know and I can’t kind of hit me I was like you know I wonder how much I’m kind of how much how much that comforts me the fact that there’s all these people out there who appreciate what I do for you somebody who didn’t necessarily have that growing up now you’ve got it is how are you dealing with that it’s still a lot of I still have a lot of like the pressure to which is why I told you earlier like I’ve gotten close to having a breakdown because I take all these kids or viewers or whatever you want to call them I take all these kids problems it’s up on on me and I’m like well if I don’t have a new video out on Saturday all these kids are gonna be disappointed it’s like so much pressure and then the last year ever since my you know dead grandma told me to chill I’ve definitely like taken a backseat to some things and like chilled out and been honest with the audience and said listen guys I need a break or listen guys I’m taking some time off or listen guys I’m doing videos once every other week and they’ve been so cool about it and and yeah so there’s there’s a lot of pressure but also I’m trying to change my mindset and be like oh these kids it’s not like they’re just living for me they I’m just entertainment now like five or six years ago some of these kids were just like living for YouTube and now there’s more mainstream does that make any sense I feel like there’s less of I don’t think any kids are gonna kill themselves if I don’t release a video on Saturday you know I’m saying I hope not right and you’re learning not to put as much pressure on yourself err I mean to deal with what it is that has become your career and that has all these ins and outs to it that and you got to find a way to stay sane I mean the fact that I’m saying well semi after this interview I don’t know well listen man we we appreciate you sitting down with us and and being candid and allowing us to get to know you a little bit better and seems like you should probably sign the table ah we need a sharpie grab the sharpie there should be one around a lot of Elvis memorabilia yeah that was a gift no but you have other Elvis memorabilia and other places here yeah we got the Elvis clock from Memphis and then this was a gift from his sister-in-law those are the only two office things this is a big sharpie I want you to what you better make your mark all right you get you get you can really go anywhere you don’t really have to come this way even like Grace and Phil went that way oh you want oh I thought this was just like people only sign it where they sit well everyone sits for your city yeah I know that bar that is the case do people ever try to sit over there and you get mad because I noticed you brought a special chair yeah yeah I need some arms I need some armrests here all right I’ll sign it when I’m Duncan yeah it’s over we’re done oh we’re done [Music] there you have it our conversation with Shane Dawson a man who used to weigh 400 pounds Wow I mean I learned a lot the whole ghost thing I guess if I saw my grandma as a ghost first of all both my grandma’s are living so that’s not possible that would be weird it would be very sad if they appeared as a ghost when they weren’t even dead but if if my dead grandma appeared to me I would vomit too I’d run into the hallway and I vomit it would be I guess that’s how I would react um honey how would you react I don’t know well all of my grandmother’s are dead I have more than 20 how many do I have I have none now I had two at one point I had three grandfather’s I haven’t seen any of they’re all dead I was seen any of them up is a ghost I’m sure you will tell us if you have had an appearance of a grandfather or grandmother in your life and it changed your life like it did shinza interesting conversation I am enjoying doing this we got three of these under our belts are you enjoying this in your car in your home and your earphones and your earbuds making an ear biscuit out of this thank you for listening we will do this again next week yeah at least I will it’s gonna keep having it I will be here yes I like having these conversations I don’t feel like something is being accomplished and document I feel like I’m learning something every single week I hope that the people are learning something every single week someone that they find interesting thank you for being here people listen to us next week [Music] [Music]