by Laura Kirk-Francis
Common Sense with Joey Barton is described as an ‘unfiltered podcast around Common Sense, and the lack of it in modern society’, with guests Tony Bellew and Laurence Fox so far. Barton, who made a name for himself as a footballer, manager, and more recently a bastion of free speech, has spent the last few months posting hyperbolic tweets on a myriad of divisive themes, presumably in an attempt to whip up attention for this very podcast. The two (2) reviews it currently has on Apple Podcasts suggests this might not have been worthwhile.
But why give Barton the attention he is so obviously craving? Because for every comment of disagreement under his tweets, there are an equal number of comments in support of his stance on women in football punditry. I might not agree, but I’m just trying to understand what some people see in Barton that others, and for now I’ll include myself in this, don’t.
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It’s 5pm on a Tuesday in February, and instead of enjoying my evening in front of the Champions League, I am instead firing up Spotify and navigating to the 2nd episode of The Common Sense Podcast, an interview with political activist and former actor, Laurence Fox. The episode description says that Barton will be chatting to Fox on ‘the social issues of modern society. Are we ever going to live in a normal world again?’.
Hang on, it’s 2hr 42 minutes long? Christ. In the words of the immortal Malcolm Tucker, I don’t even do things I enjoy for this long.
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0:10 – Let’s dive in! And we do dive straight in. Literally. Straight in. No music, no intro, no ads – Jesus Joey, where was the foreplay?
0:57 – A minute gone and Barton is still talking – we haven’t heard from his guest Laurence Fox just yet so can only assume he’s fallen asleep, which would be a reasonable assumption given that you can also hear him breathing into his microphone incredibly loudly throughout Joey’s opening monologue.
0:58 – The heavy breathing continues…
1:00 – Laurence is awake! He starts by congratulating Joey on ‘causing trouble’ and Joey jokingly assures us that he ‘didn’t want to be a part of this’. What is ‘this’, you ask? Dunno. Just *gestures around* – this.
(1:24 – I hope there’s a defibrillator somewhere near because this heavy breathing is concerning me…)
2:15 – Laurence explains there’s a ‘wonderful liberty’ that comes with telling the truth. This from a man who recently lost a high court libel battle for calling two men paedophiles. Alas, we digress.
3:00 – It’s taken 2 mins and 59 seconds longer than I thought it would but we’ve had our first mention of ‘woke’, as Fox talks about his experience playing a drug dealer in a series on Netflix, when the casting director insisted that one of the lead characters be black. ‘Why?’ asks Fox. ‘Because it’s diversity, innit’, the director responded. This is definitely how that conversation went, I’m sure of it.
3:30 – (Fox says he got the job anyway though so I’m really not sure what the moral of this story was??)
3:32 – We’re now onto a discussion about the acting industry. Barton does admit that, ‘from what he’s read’ that if you do diversify your workforce it can increase performance. However, we are ‘sending the wrong message’ that it’s not about your ability; we’ve actually just got boxes to tick and quotas to fill. This leaves me questioning what quota Fleetwood Town & Bristol Rovers were trying to fill when they were hiring him as manager.
5:40 – I’ve got a feeling name-dropping is going to be an ongoing theme during our time together. So far we’ve had Martin Luther King, Elon Musk, Ben Shapiro, and now someone called Vivek, who doesn’t get the surname treatment. Vivek? Oh yes, Vivek Ramaswamy. Barton says he likes Vivek because of a lot of what he says is commonsensical. Fair enough.
5:45 – If these opening minutes are representative of the remaining 2 hr 36 mins, we’re in for a ride. There is no suggestion of any structure to this episode whatsoever; it really is just two trains train of thought, most of the time going in the same direction. Trying to follow the conversation feels like I’m listening to someone describe the dream they had last night in a different language.
5:30 – My main reflection thus far is that Barton sounds a lot more nervous and hesitant than I had expected, which is in stark contrast to how he comes across on social media. His interview technique could do with some refining, but in fairness that’s a criticism that could quite easily be levelled at an enormous number of celebrities with podcasts. Barton repeatedly refers to things he’s read, or people he admires, in an attempt to highlight that his point of view has been formed by extensive research and a desire to ‘find other points of view’.(Barton went to university in 2013 to study a Philosophy degree)
6:27 – Barton initiates a conversation about Fox’s acting career. Somehow, inexplicably, we end up at George Floyd and Black Lives Matter. I’ve also noticed that Barton has this habit of listing things in quick succession, which in fairness to him are definitely related, but could really do with a little bit more context. ‘You know…the thing with the Harvard, Professor….Claudine Gray…DEI, Bill Akeman, the fight that’s going on in the States currently’.
7:47 – I’m momentarily startled by the sound of a phone ringing, but knowing mine has been on silent for over a decade I quickly realise it’s actually on the recording. Slick.
9:30 – 10 mins in and we’ve arrived at Barton’s favourite topic – women in sports, specifically football punditry. He describes this topic as ‘the scab that I picked off’, which is an interesting way of depicting a pile-on so violent that ITV were forced to put out a statement. I’m genuinely intrigued to see if he’ll offer any further explanation of his viewpoint on female pundits here beyond what he has already tweeted – but am left disappointed. ‘They’re not correct and not very good’. Well then, that’s shut me up! Case closed.
9:43 – Fox prefaces his response to this topic by caveating that his niece plays for Millwall and as a result I’m forced to forgive the misogyny that’s definitely about to come out of his mouth.
10:13 – Oh! Fox declares that he actually prefers women’s tennis! Serena will be thrilled.
(10:20 – He then says that women’s football is ‘noticeably crapper whether you like it or not’ and then repeatedly uses the phrase ‘woke landmine’)
10:54 – I have to rewind this bit a few times to make sure I’ve heard correctly. I *think* Fox is saying that women commentating on men’s football is as fanciful as in films when we are forced to accept that ‘little 5ft 6 women superheroes can kick the shit out of 6ft 4, 250lb men…and it’s just not…they’d just crush them in 2 seconds’. Certainly food for thought.
10:55 – Fox laments the ‘victim-blaming’ response of these female pundits, suggesting that they should just ‘take [the criticism] on the fucking chin, babe!’. On an unrelated note, Fox is currently suing a man who called him ‘racist’ on social media.
11:37 – Back to those pesky female pundits, Joey again suggests they’re just ‘not very good’ and that ‘they are taking people’s jobs’. I’m keen for a bit more detail here – firstly, who is they? Whose jobs are they taking? Care to venture some suggestions? No? Fair enough, we’ve probably got a lot of other things to cover in this next 2 and a half hours.
11:50 – Barton complains that these female pundits are in a position of privilege, because they can exist without fear of being replaced well as being protected from what he refers to as ‘constructive feedback’. Maybe it’s just me but I’m not sure comparing Eni Aluko and Lucy Ward to Fred and Rose West could be described as constructive feedback. While on this topic, Barton also compares these female pundits to a hypothetical situation in which because he has a driving license, he should be allowed to commentate on Formula 1. Zing, mic drop.
15:53 – Ok, now here is something I genuinely did not know. Barton explains that he was the first person to wear Rainbow Laces, which a quick Google tells me is true. During this segment though Barton adopts this slightly disarming soft voice to perhaps show he’s being sensitive about this issue, particularly as we touch upon the suicide of Justin Fashanu, the first openly gay professional player. He also says he ‘lowered the drawbridge to the LGBT+ community.’ This immediately conjures up an image of Helm’s Deep lowering the drawbridge to allow the Elves during the 2nd Lord of the Rings film.
Think my concentration is faltering a bit here…but the show must go on.
18:34 – Fox goes on a rant about the ‘LGBT+ progressive flag’, and how him and his mates stopped watching England due to the ‘politicisation of sport’. He specifically says that he cheered for France in the 2022 World Cup Semi-Final, in protest of the England team’s choice to kneel ahead of kick off. Très cool.
24:05 – We arrive at the debate about trans people in sport. Barton brings up an example of a 51 year old swimming with 12 year old girls (I’m reluctant to Google this, but do so and find the article to which he’s referring). During this section Fox repeatedly uses the word ‘deviant’ or ‘deviancy’. Their opinions are as you can probably imagine but Fox at least admits he’s being transphobic.
26:42 – Barton brings up Pareto’s Law of 80:20. I have genuinely no idea where this is about to go but I am genuinely curious.
26:45 – ‘80% of people are good. 20% are bad’. Fair enough.
27:33 – Fox makes the comparison between allowing trans women into the women’s changing rooms to having a wheelchair ramp in a townhall, but also states ‘If you [a trans person] want to come [into the women’s changing rooms] and knock one out as a pretend woman, that’s dangerous.’ Fox says this is in a very casual, dismissive way that I honestly find quite abhorrent.
30:11 – Ok, back to Fox’s career. Barton repeatedly says that Fox is from a dynastic thespian family, and asks whether his dream is to win an Oscar. Fox replies that he’s just not interested in accolades, but that he did well at acting. So humble, so down to earth!
30:34 – As we reach the half an hour mark this discussion loses me entirely – we’re jumping from what acting is, method acting, something about Gladiator, something about Russell Crowe doing press-ups….and I realise it’s time for me to have a break. So far we’ve covered everything that I expected from a Joey Barton podcast, which leaves me genuinely concerned that we’ve still got over 2 hours to go. But I am no quitter – I just need some caffeine, so I’ll be back shortly with the rest of the episode.
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Joking aside, I listened to this to try to understand what might lie behind the views Joey has been sharing. So far, I come away knowing that he holds these views pretty strongly – that’s his prerogative. I also find it impossible to see beyond a man with such an appalling history of violence, and who recently described his brother’s racist murder of Anthony Walker as ‘a scrap’. I just don’t find any real reason for the views he’s sharing, beyond a desire for sensationalism to drive up engagement for this very podcast (to which I have now, regrettably, added one or two listens).
This podcast is not going to change anyone’s opinion of either Barton or Fox, so all I can really do now is that which would upset Joey the most – stick to football.
(Oh would you look at that, Kevin de Bruyne has scored)
Laura Kirk-Francis 
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