this post was submitted on 02 Mar 2025
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Do you have evidence that they're plants? This is the first I've heard of that accusation. He does get an unusually high number of hecklers, and it fuels a lot of his online content, so I wouldn't be shocked if they're plants, but I haven't heard any definitive proof. I'd just as soon believe that people heckle him more because they think they're smarter than his previous hecklers or want attention or something, but idk.
Yeah. The dude has a TON of heckler videos. For starters.. It’s incredibly unrealistic for a comedian to be heckled that often. Secondly, his responses are always perfectly timed and executed without hesitation. Every time. With not even a slight pause or moment to collect his thoughts before tearing into the person.
Only Robin Williams is that skilled at improv.
I’ll add that he’s well known for behind a huge asshole in the comedy circuit. Look it up. And lastly, heckling generally gets you tossed out of clubs. None of his plants ever get tossed that I’ve seen.
Still not hearing any definitive proof. Professional comedians, especially well educated ones, can and do have quick and witty comebacks pretty often. And like I said, it's possible that he gets heckled so much because of his reputation for engaging with hecklers, so it may attract overconfident hecklers to come see him.
I'm not gonna knock the late, great Robin Williams, but it's a little weird to say that he's the only person capable of disarming a heckler this effectively. I think most accomplished comedians could do what Steve Hofstetter does, more or less; he is much more knowledgeable about economics and civics than most probably are, so he's able to wield that handily.
Idk anything about his reputation for being an asshole. He's constantly getting work and tours with a consistent group and seems like a good dude, so I have my doubts, and I'm not interested in looking that up for myself when you're not even willing to do it to prove it to me. And yes, hecklers do get tossed from his shows. He usually tries to get them to stop, and then if they don't then he usually embarrasses them to the point that they leave on their own, but some are so shameless that they do need to be removed. That generally happens after the rest of the crowd gets so pissed off that a fight seems likely.
I'm not saying that there aren't plants. I'm saying that I'm only seeing speculation and no actual proof to support that accusation. I'm not down with alleging that he's a fraud when there's no evidence to do so. Imagine destroying his livelihood just because you didn't believe he could possibly be this good at his full time job lol. Comedians are notoriously good at this sort of thing.
Ahah, but how could a professional comedian - someone who is literally trained to be funny in front of an audience - be that good at being funny in front of an audience? Checkmate liberal!
Do these people have any idea how stupid they sound? This is the dumbest conspiracy theory of all time. Yes, some people are actually just really good at being witty on the spot. Not all stand up comedians just recite a bunch of prewritten jokes, most of them (especially the really good ones) teach themselves how to be improvisationally funny. These idiots sound like they've never seen an improv comedy show, or a British panel show or any other kind of improv comedy.
And the idea that it would be hard to get genuine hecklers by saying vaguely left wing stuff in America is even dumber. Sorry America but opinionated assholes are basically 90% of your population. If anything it's surprising he doesn't get more hecklers.
WTF does any of this have to do with politics? Seriously, are you really that person that injects the “checkmate libruls!” bullshit into every topic you find yourself in?
And, who are “these people?”
Do you mean these people with personal opinions that are derivative of their own observations? Because, man- I really hate to break it to you, but- that’s how shit works for everyone that thinks for themselves.
And since you made this political, I’ll say that maybe the reason you are so butt-hurt by the opinions of others lies within the fact that you people don’t like it when others think differently than what your own programming suggests.
Maybe it’s best that you work on learning not to concern yourself so much with politicizing people opinions of comedians and more time asking yourself whey you feel the need to do so to begin with…
mmmmkay?
Yikes. Seems like you just proved their point lol. The "programming" you're unhappy with is just critical thinking. Instead of assuming some grand conspiracy is at play, why not take a breath and consider different ideas for how things got to be the way that they are? And it's really no secret that a lot of the hecklers are conservatives as they're usually quite proud of that. Moderates to trump republicans to literal Nazis have heckled him. Acknowledging the reality of the political ideals of most of these hecklers is not politicizing this, it's just pointing out facts. If that's offensive to you, then maybe it's you who is butt-hurt here.
Hilarious! Thanks for the laugh. Though I’m not going to apologize that I hurt your feeling by not liking your favorite comedian, I’ll just agree to disagree on something that is more than likely entirely irrelevant to both of us.
Go find an argument elsewhere.
Just look him up. There’s plant of people that have flowered with and for him that say he’s a huge asshole.
But for some reason, the internet loves protecting him.
What? I'm really trying to understand, but you're making it pretty difficult.
It's clear that you have no evidence or you wouldn't keep telling me to do the research to find the evidence that supports your claims. I'm not sure why you think I care so much about this when you don't even care enough to cite a single source. It's not my job to prove you right here.
There's really nothing unbelievable to me about his hecklers except for maybe the sheer quantity, but I'm not a comedian so maybe this isn't actually so extreme. Maybe if I did 300 shows per year and filmed all of them, I'd have a similar trove, especially if tickets were relatively cheap and I had a reputation for being "that guy who owns hecklers". I bet the truth is that he doesn't plant hecklers, but every interaction with one is more content for the content farm, so he's not actively interested in dissuading hecklers from being a problem. I've seen a video or two where it seemed like he was provoking somebody a little because they were quietly talking or not paying attention during the show, so by initiating over a minor thing I think he was inviting a real interruption. I don't think he plants, but I think he welcomes drama. Maybe that's not cool, but idk, it's pretty much impossible to be a successful content creator without resorting to hooks or clickbait or elevating energies.
If you have proof, bring that bombshell to a journalist. If you don't have proof and you just don't like the guy, stop watching him.
The quantity of hecklers we see actually makes complete sense based on what he said in this 8-year old reddit thread.
Thanks for doing the legwork. That was a good read. It makes a lot of sense now that I see real numbers. It even makes sense that he's pretty confrontational to establish that he won't put up with it. Real teacher energy there lol, and I think I've heard him say that he was a teacher earlier in his life.
I'm glad I didn't just outright believe that claim about plants. I was trying to be open minded if there were any credible bits of evidence to prove otherwise, but I really didn't have any reason to believe he used plants until I saw that accusation. How fucking silly to say such a thing with absolutely nothing to back it up and keep saying "look it up." Well you looked it up and found a reasonable explanation from the man himself lol. Thanks :)
It’s plain as day that no comedian in the world gets heckled at that frequency. That alone is enough to tell you something is up.
But there’s also tons of write-ups people have made that have worked with/for him to illustrate that he’s a huge asshole that would do that.
I’m not going to die on this hill though. I honestly don’t know why people go to such extremes to argue against someone opinions. I don’t care if or that you like this dude.
Source? Unless you can prove otherwise, I think I'm ready to call you a goddamn liar. I don't think you're qualified to say what a reasonable frequency of hecklers is, and you keep implying that there's evidence but I'm not sure you've even seen any yourself. And if there are "tons of write-ups" on this, how do you know that they're not just coming from people making shit up to try to destroy his career? This is why a source matters. The guy tours with the same group of people all the time. Did one of them do one of these "write-ups"? Or was it maybe one of his hecklers who was pissed off that they got tossed from one of his shows and so they wanted vengeance? Or a bitter ex? Just some hateful stranger who doesn't like his face? Who?
I honestly don’t care what you think of my opinion on this. I’d suggest you take a moment and realize how bent out of shape you’re getting about this and just let it go.
Words have meaning. You're accusing him of something pretty egregious and offering no evidence. You're trying to cancel him because of how you feel, but facts don't care about your feelings. And now you're trying to convince yourself that I'm the one who took this too far just for questioning your claims instead of just believing you. I think you need to take some time and really think about why you are the way that you are and see what you can do to be a more pleasant person instead of being so upset and cynical. Get some sunlight and bump up those vitamin d numbers or something, dude.
Yeah- I didn’t read any of that.
Seriously though, is there a better way for me to illustrate to you that I don’t care? Because I would think that anyone capable of understanding this would have just walked away the first time I said it.
It’s become no surprise to me at this point that you would find yourself believing that planted people in a barrage of heckle videos are legit.
Now go ahead and get your last word in- it seems to be vitally important to you. I promise not to interfere!
lol k