Hey, I'm Candace Lim.

And I'm Kate Lindsay.

And you're listening to I see why am I.

In case you missed it.

Slate's podcast about internet culture. And Kate, will I be seeing you at the Riyadh Comedy Festival? You will not be seeing me there, but just no, it's not because I'm taking a principled stand. It is because, clearly, they did not offer either of us enough money. And we turned it down. Exactly.

Exactly.

And here's the deal.

If you don't know what this is, basically right now as we speak, the Riyadh Comedy Festival,

it is happening in Saudi Arabia.

And let's just say Saudi Arabia, not known for their human rights. In fact, human rights watch. They call their human rights record abysmal. And that's not good.

Yeah, yeah. Just sort of clarify if anyone was worried, that means bad. Yep, yeah, yep, yep. And yet, a number of comedians were seemingly paid high enough sums to kind of put that aside. You know, someone who has appeared is Dave Chappelle. There's

Bill Burke. There's Pete Davidson. I mean, people in comedy circles had been discussing this

festival for some time, but it actually wasn't until actor and comedian,

Zach Woods, who I love, just putting it out there in case he's listening, he made a TikTok

that ended up pushing this whole thing mainstream and we can listen to a bit of it.

Guys, it's that special time of year. It's the Riyadh Comedy Festival.

And all of your favorite comedians are performing at the pleasure of Turkey

al-Shake and he is the head of the entertainment authority over there and he has so many

people thrown in prison because they tweeted stuff he didn't like about the soccer team or

whatever that there's a wing of a prison nicknamed after him where they hang people by their

heels from the ceiling.

Now, there's a lot of drips, kill joys and dwebozoids who are saying,

...