How the Host of One of the Most Popular Podcasts Made America’s Favorite Hairstylist Cry Over Trans Rights

As the ancient proverb goes, you can’t trust a man with a podcast—a classification that might, as of late, include even actor, screenwriter, director, and Armchair Expert podcast host Dax Shepard. Shepard—who is famous for both his work on comedies like Punk’d and Idiocracy and for being married to Kristen Bell—is currently under fire for a recent Armchair Expert interview with Queer Eye beautyologist Jonathan Van Ness, in which the two somehow got into a debate about transgender and gender-nonconforming rights that left Van Ness in tears. Van Ness, who came out as nonbinary in 2019 and uses “they/them” pronouns, went on the show to promote the expansion of their long-running podcast Getting Curious but quickly found themself in the position of defending transgender and nonbinary rights against Shepard, who spent much of the interview playing a dangerous game of devil’s advocate.

The episode has caused a stir in the week since it aired, prompting criticisms of Shepard’s interviewing style and praise for Van Ness, who maintained grace even in the face of subsequent mockery by conservative figures like Megyn Kelly. But for those who are unfamiliar with Shepard’s later-in-life body of work, the biggest question on your mind may be “What is the astronaut from Zathura: A Space Adventure doing Joe Rogan–ing it up all over the place?” Here’s our best attempt to break down Shepard’s latest difficult interview and why it may or may not be par for the Armchair Expert course.

Don’t tell me there’s another culturally impactful podcast of questionable taste and/or politics that I have to be aware of.

Yes, unfortunately, I am duty-bound to introduce to you Armchair Expert, a celebrity interview podcast started in 2018 that is co-hosted by Shepard and Bell’s longtime friend Monica Padman. The show was initially known for its celebrity guests, who would talk about their personal lives and their careers. Spotify acquired the show, which had risen in popularity, in 2021, with the first Spotify-exclusive episode featuring Barack Obama. The move to Spotify helped Shepard turn the show into a much larger podcast network, adding additional shows like Experts on Expert (in which he interviews top non-celebrity professionals), Armchaired & Dangerous (which rehashes common conspiracy theories), and others. Oh, and the podcast’s fans, in case you’re curious, are known as “Armcherries.”

What makes this show so popular? 

Because Shepard directs the conversation to be about the celebrity guests’ lives instead of just whatever new projects they have to promote, the conversations feel real in comparison to the played-up back-and-forth they might partake in on a late-night talk show. This is what made Armchair Expert a household name among podcast fans, but on top of that, Shepard is also a well-read interviewer with a wide range of interests, which can result in some very interesting non-celebrity expert guests and an actually intriguing line of questioning. It feels as if he can talk to anyone about anything—and he does! He often gets into the weeds on difficult topics, never shying away from conversations about hot-button political arguments, relationships, marginalization, and various forms of trauma and tragedy. But one of the show’s biggest strengths is Shepard’s vulnerability and relatability. Sure, he may be rich, famous, and married to America’s sweetheart, Kristen Bell, but Shepard is very vocal about his identity as a recovering addict and sexual assault survivor who witnessed abuse while growing up in poverty with a single mother. His roller-coaster life experience makes him seem like a good representative of America’s everyman.

Got it. He seems like a real guy who can get exclusive people to talk about real things. So what happened with Jonathan Van Ness? 

Van Ness went on Armchair Expert to discuss their podcast Getting Curious—a show similar to Armchair Expert in which Van Ness interviews professionals in different fields—which began in 2015 and has since become incredibly popular, even landing a Netflix adaptation. The hairstylist was supposed to come on Shepard’s show to, in part, promote their podcast’s new spinoff shows—the topical Curious Now and the beauty-focused Pretty Curious—but the conversation quickly veered into tense territory when Shepard and Van Ness got into a debate about transgender rights, from gender-affirming care to trans kids playing sports.

How did the conversation even get there?

Shepard and Van Ness were talking about Shepard’s home state of Michigan and how much they both love Michigan’s governor, Gretchen Whitmer, which led Shepard to kvetch about how dissatisfied he is with Biden’s presidential performance by comparison. This led to a conversation about political leanings, misinformation, and disinformation, particularly in journalism. Van Ness asserted that misinformation and disinformation play a large role when it comes to conversations about and policies pertaining to gender-affirming care and abortion, and pushed back against Shepard’s claim that the New York Times is a liberal publication, pointing out that the newspaper has a history of politically divisive, and at times reactionary, op-eds. The debate continued, eventually leading to the nonbinary activist giving a lengthy explanation of the harms of misinformation and disinformation with the topic of transgender rights.

From Michigan to disagreeing over trans issues—talk about escalation! What did the “debate” come down to?

Shepard said that some people, perhaps including himself, are earnestly concerned about letting a teenage swimmer who has spent their entire life as their assigned male gender compete against female swimmers a year after deciding to transition to become a trans woman. Van Ness pointed out that this same child, who may have wanted to live as a little girl their entire life, might live in a state like Iowa, which prohibits hormone blockers or the use of hormones that would allow them to physically develop in line with their desired gender. And beyond that, Van Ness pointed out, most kids just want to play—they’re not gunning for Olympic medals.

Van Ness also noted that some of the main arguments against trans kids’ participation in sports—it’s unfair because men have biological advantages in sports over women—focus on the wrong things. If we were really worried about fairness in sports, we would also be addressing socioeconomic disparities. If we were really worried about biological advantages in sports, we would have turned a more critical eye to someone like Michael Phelps, who was literally built to be a beast in the swimming pool. And beyond that, despite such a small percentage of the population identifying as trans, trans people are disproportionately targeted in the national political conversation.

And how did Shepard respond?

Shepard went straight for the position of devil’s advocate, acting as a stand-in for the conservatives and moderates of America who question trans rights claims. Van Ness compared talking to Shepard with “talking to [their] father” (and not in a good way). When Van Ness stated, “What we know about misinformation and disinformation is, when you have an outsized reaction to something, there’s a good chance that you’re being exposed to misinformation,” Shepard came back, after a commercial break, to say he does wish for trans women athletes to have access to sports but questioned whether he should “elevate her rights over women,” taking up the classic transphobe’s line of trans women not really being women. This was further emphasized by Shepard’s subsequent claim that “we’re pretending that women aren’t the ultimate marginalized class throughout history.”

What are you even supposed to say to that? How does a debate like that end?

The debate ended with Shepard explaining that what’s upsetting to him is, even if he agrees with nine out of 10 of Van Ness’ points, he’s still treated like an enemy for not agreeing with all 10. Van Ness disagreed, but then began to cry, saying they’re “so tired of having to fight for little kids because they just want to be included. I wish that people were as passionate about little kids being able to be included or grow up as they were about fictitious women’s fairness in sports.”

That has to be the most awkward conclusion to an interview ever.

To his credit, Shepard did apologize during the episode, explaining that he understood if Van Ness was disappointed in him, and that he never intended to touch on this topic or upset Van Ness in the process. Van Ness, in turn, explained that they were “emotionally exhausted” because they’re always having to defend their existence and their rights. Both parties agreed that, despite the nitty-gritty of the discussion, it’s clear that society is in the midst of a transgender moral panic. At the end of the episode, as they were signing off, Shepard chimed in once more to apologize after realizing that he, a cisgender, heterosexual white male of wealth and status, holds a lot more power than a trans or gender-nonconforming person. All is forgiven, and Van Ness suggested that their relationship is stronger now and they might “scissor into the sunset” happily ever after.

What do you make of all this?

I think Shepard is an interesting character study. However, I think we’d be better off if we saw Shepard for who I believe he really is: a caring, often stubborn person who has complex, center-leaning politics, a fraught history of trying to understand or undo different beliefs, and an interest—though at times clumsy—in hearing out every point of view.

At the same time, while I understand his central argument that conversations like this are important, I don’t think it’s healthy for people to always have to be on the defensive about their human rights. Those kinds of lines of questioning—when someone says they’re “just asking questions” while they continue to invalidate a core part of your experience—don’t need to be parroted on massive platforms by trusted people. I think it is well within Van Ness’ rights to be upset at the way it all went down.