Podcast Summary: The Rubin Report
Episode: "Is This the Real Reason Candace Owens Is Pushing Conspiracies?"
Date: December 12, 2025
Host: Dave Rubin
Guests: Viva Frei, Gad Saad

Episode Overview

This episode of The Rubin Report delves into the escalating culture wars, conspiracy-fueled media, the pitfalls of performative empathy (dubbed "suicidal empathy"), the fragmentation of right-wing unity, and recent events surrounding Candace Owens. The conversation widens to critique political rhetoric, institutional distrust, culture-driven policies, and the erosion of reasoned discourse, all wrapped in the distinctly irreverent, skeptical, and combative style the show is known for.

1. Candace Owens & Conspiracy Monetization

[02:08 – 09:01]

Key Points

• Candace Owens' Post-Charlie Kirk Content: Dave notes that after Charlie Kirk’s assassination, Candace Owens and others have produced a stream of conspiracy-driven content, referencing a post from Viva Frei showing the surge in her video views.
• Motivation: Clicks & Money: The group debates whether the proliferation of conspiracies is "just a click and money chase."
  • Dave Rubin: Suggests the motive is often financial and for "bank," but wonders if it could be that simple.
  • Viva Frei: Clarifies he shared the data not to shame Candace for monetization, but to highlight the shift in focus and "borderline exclusivity" of conspiracy themes in her content.
    • Quote [03:50]: “It is the borderline exclusivity of her content over the last three months. … it's all of her content for the last three months, 24/7.”
• Accusations of Projection: Viva calls out Candace Owens for accusing others of profiting while doing the same herself.

Notable Insight

• Gad Saad, on Content Creation Ethics [05:45]:
  • "The metric that they're trying to optimize is…clickbait. … The seven deadly sins, which we've known now for almost a millennia, have pride on top. It also has greed…Regrettably, many of these content creators are exhibiting exactly that."

2. The Behavioral Science of Conspiracies

[09:01 – 14:24]

Key Points

• Entrenched Beliefs: Gad discusses the challenge of changing minds set in conspiracy.
  • Quote [10:32]:
    "The inability to get people to change their opinions, irrespective of how much evidence…Once it is deeply anchored…oftentimes the more evidence…I show you that is contrary to your position, the more anchored…"
• Pattern Recognition and Illusory Causality: Gad explains how human pattern recognition can facilitate conspiratorial thinking.
• Rational Skepticism vs. Paranoia: Viva distinguishes between healthy skepticism about the official narrative and unfalsifiable, marketable paranoia.
  • Quote [14:24]:
    “People literally don't know what to believe…conspiracy theories, there are always different types... It's good to ask questions, but not unfalsifiable questions that only lead to convincing people that, you know, up is down and down is up.”

3. Institutional Distrust & the Social Fragmentation of the Right

[14:24 – 17:47]

Key Points

• General consensus among the hosts that a collapse in faith in institutional power has fueled conspiracy culture.
• Right-wing infighting: While the right prides itself on debate and disagreement (as opposed to perceived cultish unity on the left), constant infighting erodes political goals.

4. Extension: Anna Kasparian & Doubled-Down Tribalism

[16:26 – 17:47]

Key Moment

• Dave describes Anna Kasparian refusing to acknowledge facts that contradict her ideological stance.
  • Quote [17:12]:
    "Because her team has to win and her team says that Israel and the Jews are evil, it's always going to point there."
• Gad reflects on engagement with ideologically entrenched interlocutors who deflect with unrelated arguments.

5. Gavin Newsom, California, & Political Projection

[20:13 – 31:31]

Key Points

• Newsom's Rhetoric: Dave and guests poke fun at Gavin Newsom’s statements about his children and California's "successes," and how his rants reveal more about himself than those he attacks.
  • Quote [20:13] (Gavin Newsom): "I have to look at my kids in the goddamn eye..."
• California "Success" Narrative: Newsom touts California’s R&D, Fortune 500 companies, and economic growth.
  • Dave counters with data on outmigration: “1.6 million have left CA in the last five years.” [26:21]
  • Gad: Market exit is the truest survey—"How you walk is a much better predictor of your preferences.” [26:43]
• Creative Stats Manipulation: Viva accuses Newsom of the "shotgun argument"—overwhelming with unrelated claims and misapplied stats.
  • "He referred to the website as transparent…now I know you're lying to me." [28:36]

6. Contentious Social Issues: Transgender Legislation & Cultural Trends

[30:50 – 38:17]

Key Points

• Newsom claims to be the most pro-trans governor, while also supporting fairness in girls’ athletics.
• Hosts lampoon his inconsistency and inability to articulate the LGBTQ+ acronym.
• Gad: The current trend in academia promotes identity (“two-spirit,” “non-binary”) over scientific ability—even in AI research.
  • Quote on Canadian university hiring practices [35:51]:
    "…If you applied for artificial intelligence, you had to be two spirit or non binary or so…"
• Viva and Dave warn of the medicalization and social contagion of transgender identification among children.
  • Quote [37:23]:
    “We will look back on it the way we look back at lobotomies.”

7. Suicidal Empathy, Crime, and Racial Guilt

[39:40 – 51:17]

Key Points

• Performative White Guilt: Discussion around Kentucky Rep. Sarah Stalker's monologue about feeling "bad about being white."
  • Viva: “You want to know what white supremacy in its truest form looks like? It's that woman right there…” [41:16]
• Danger of Empathy Misapplied: Gad gives example of a white woman defending Black men, being raped in Haiti, and her continued self-blame—"suicidal empathy."
  • Quote [44:29]:
    “When you get a white woman getting raped violently by a black man, that is further solidifying the fact that it is white supremacy that's the problem in the world, and that she's been enriched by this rape.”
• Victimhood Virtue Signaling: Clips of leftist activists agreeing with their own mugging because of "indigenous land" narratives.
  • Viva: “I need my privilege. Privilege to help people. ... The only people who are apologizing for the privilege of being white are the white supremacists.” [46:18]
• Alex Karp's Critique:
  • Quote [49:23]:
    "Our country has selective empathy for everybody but working class, particularly white males..."

8. Cultural Marxism, Islamization, & Western Identity

[51:17 – 60:22]

Key Points

• Anti-White Sentiment: Discussion over "cultural Marxism," the positioning of working-class whites as targets, and the morphing of class resentment into racial antagonism.
• Islamic Call to Prayer in Minneapolis: Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey introduces the Islamic call to prayer.
  • Dave: "Wherever you are in America, you should not be subjected to the Muslim or any other call to prayer five times a day and that does not make you a bigot or anything else.” [54:24]
  • Gad reflects on "boiling frog parable"—a slow creep of cultural concessions leading to stark change.
  • Viva: The US Constitution protects private religious expression, not public imposition.
    • Quote [56:26]:
      “You want to practice your religion. That’s what the constitution protected. It didn’t protect the mass broadcast of it and the imposition of it on other people.”

9. Corporate Monopolies & the Future of Media

[62:14 – 65:23]

Key Points

• Netflix Acquisition of Warner Brothers: Discussion of consolidation leading to cultural homogenization.
  • Viva: “It’s getting too big to survive…they’re going to lose creativity…they’re going to collapse and lose out to independent creators, especially AI.”
• Dave notes that fan-made, AI-generated mini-films feel more authentic and compelling than recent Disney output.
  • Gad: Market forces will inevitably punish "woke capitalism."

10. Wokeness & Identity Politics: Snow White & the Seven… People

[65:36 – End]

Key Points

• Discussion of Piers Morgan segment with a little person (dwarf) actor being told, by a progressive guest, he shouldn’t call himself a “dwarf.”
  • Viva: “That white dude saying you dwarf dwarves who had a market in movies…you’re all going to be out of work…This is dwarf denialism, this is erasure of dwarfdom from the world.”
  • Gad describes being “sandbagged” by panels of wokesters on talk shows.

Memorable Quotes & Timestamps

• On Conspiracy Monetization:
  • Viva: “It is the borderline exclusivity of her content over the last three months. … it's all of her content for the last three months, 24/7.” [03:50]
• On Human Irrationality:
  • Gad: "The inability to get people to change their opinions, irrespective of how much evidence…Once it is deeply anchored…oftentimes the more evidence…contrary to your position, the more anchored…" [10:32]
• On Performative Empathy:
  • Gad: "When you get a white woman getting raped violently by a black man, that is further solidifying…the fact that it is white supremacy that's the problem in the world, and that she's been enriched by this rape." [44:29]
• On California's Direction:
  • Dave: “Where are people going and where are people fleeing from? To me, that is the answer.” [26:43]
• On Religious Accomodation and Social Fabric:
  • Viva: “You want to practice your religion. That’s what the constitution protected. It didn’t protect the mass broadcast of it…” [56:26]

Final Thoughts

The episode is a sweeping, snarky critique of contemporary media, identity politics, and institutional failure, sparing neither left nor right from scrutiny. Candace Owens’ recent conspiratorial turn serves as a springboard for examining the deeper incentives and pathologies driving public discourse—from monetization and narcissism on the influencer end, to the anxieties, apathies, and sometimes irrationalities that mark the wider public. The group ends with a characteristic mix of mockery and warning on the state of cultural and political identity, punctuated with a reminder that, “You are both pro dwarf and intellectual giant.”