This podcast is brought to you by the Albany public library main branch the generosity of listeners like you. What is a podcast? God daddy these people talk as much as you do! Razib Khans unsupervised learning.
Hey everybody this is Razib Khan with the Unsupervised Learning podcast and I'm here today with my friend Leighton Woodhouse. Leighton, like many of us has a sub stack. Leightonwoodhouse.substack.com. So check that out. Leighton Can you tell them about your other projects and what else you're working on?
Yeah, I'm a journalist. I've written for a number of outlets. And as you mentioned, most recently, most frequently for my sub stack for my own sub stack. And I'm also a documentary filmmaker. And I've been mostly writing on the substack but uh, but I'm, I intend to do a little bit of filmmaking on the substack as well. And actually, I have a video I'll put out tomorrow.
Yeah, um, so just some, some context, some history for new listeners. The last time I talked to Leighton in podcast form was two years ago, a little over two years ago, maybe two and a third years ago, was the summer of 2019. This was back during the Trump administration. It was before Black Lives Matter. There's just a lot of stuff going on in the world. But a lot has happened since then. And I know Leighton through you know, his early podcast or his podcast project was it Zaid Jilani who was also online, and I've talked to Zaid on this podcast, and they're kind of part of a crew of what I would call heterodox left people. That includes a Glenn Greenwald, probably the most prominent representative of that group. But um, you know, the last couple of years have seen some changes in terms of orientations, affiliations, or just perception. So like, you know, to be concrete about it. Leightons and Zaid are friends. And I see a lot of stuff from normie Liberals talking about how Zaid is now a Republican shill. I don't really say anything, because I don't say much. I did point out, you know, that he was anti Israel before it was cool. Yeah. But um, I don't know, like, are you just like, I'm not like even giving you anything to work with here. But how do you feel? Because I just feel like you're in a wierd... like, some of the stuff I see. I'm just like, Ooh, is he allowed to say that?
You know, one of the things I like best about Zaid that is that he is absolutely, he just does not give a fuck, am I allowed to say that on the podcast?
Yeah, you can use whatever words you want. Well, there are certain words, you can't use that. I think you know, which words you can't use. Okay,
okay. He. And so he's been that way since the first time I met him. I met him initially, a long time ago was over a decade ago. And that was when I was working for the stock mentor film company called Brave New Films that does like basically lefty propaganda. And we were making a documentary about Afghanistan and Zaid, was over at CAP, at think progress and they wouldn't allow him to criticize the Afghanistan war. And so he just started collaborating with us, which is obviously, you know, not what CAP would have preferred. And, and because, you know, he wasn't going to be told what he could and could not say. And so that was kind of when I first met him, it was already he was already being defiant against sort of the rules, the political gags that we're putting on, put on him by his employer, in order to take a more left wing position. Now he's very, very anti Afghanistan war. So he's always been like that. He hasn't changed. The left has changed. It's become much more doctrinaire. It's become much more much less empirical and, and more faith based. And he's, you know, he and I, and other folks like Lee Fong and Glenn as you mentioned, Matt Taibbi and other folks have have responded to that change in the left. So his politics I think, are more or less, maybe they maybe they're a little bit more conservative than it used to be. But I, I'd say that they're, they're pretty much the same.
Yeah, I mean, so like, if you go to your substack right, now you're talking about the Beagle experiment with Fauci and whatnot, it's, it's interesting, because on one level, you would think that this is, you know, animal rights. It's not exclusively left, there are conservative animal rights people too, or, you know, humanitarian treatment of animals. Let me just make us a big catch word. You know, I don't want to say animal rights sometimes because they, you know, that has connotations. But in any case, you know, this is this is mostly a left coded thing. But um, apparently. So I'm hearing that the Washington Post from Glenn Greenwald is running a hit piece on the organization that was pointing out Fauci's connections. I mean, what is going on here is animal rights. Is animal rights now racist, I mean, I just asking...
well, so I've cared about animal rights for a long time I've written about the evil Beagle experimentation with Glenn. Well before Fauci was in the news, so this is not a new issue for me. And in fact, something like eight years ago, I made a short documentary about it. So this is not a new issue. For me, it's not a new issue issue for Glenn. What is new, actually, it's not new that Fauci has been at the head of this experimentation. That's been the case for many, many years. But what is new is that Fauci is now this high profile person and sort of a liberal icon. So this group, white coat, White Coat Waste Project, that that did FOIAs and discovered all these these cruel experiments. You know, they have, it was started by a guy who used to be a Republican operative, but he used - he worked in the animal lab, and he cares about animal about the animal protection. That's what motivates him. And another guy who was a PETA for many years, hardly a right wing organization, and they just struck upon, you know, they knew that that animal rights and animal protection is a trans partisan issue, there's no reason why people on the left or on the right should care more than people on the other side about animal welfare, it is just beyond the partisan divide, or it should be - compassion for animals is beyond the partisan divide. And, and nobody was reaching out to the conservative side of the column of the aisle. And they struck upon this, this idea that, you know, this is taxpayer waste. It's not only animal cruelty, but it's our taxpayer dollars that are paying for this stuff. And that would resonate with Republicans, and they were very, very right about that. But by the way, you know, the Republicans who they had lined up behind them, which include people like Matt Gates, and and David Brat when he was in office. You know, these are these are very conservative people. Their their issue is really not the taxpayer waste. That's just gravy, Rand Paul is another one, the taxpayer waste issue, you know, it's just gravy. It's insofar as it makes it even worse, that we're paying for it, but they care about it, because they care about animal welfare. Those politicians have been interested in this issue, because they care about what animal welfare and by the way, it's not like, they get political dividends for it. It's not like in anybody's self interest to go, you know, to spend your time in Congress, trying to protect animals, the only reason you would really do it is because you care.
Yeah, I, you know, I do have to say that, um, it's, you know, I don't want to get into like the ideological, there's no ideological thing here. People have pets, people have dogs, people have cats, people have human universal instincts. And so I think what you're pointing out here is that this isn't something you need to necessarily actually be educated on. Whatever you think about the use of animals in science, the instinct, I think, to be revolted. By some of this, some of what happens is actually natural. Now, we can have a discussion on the trade offs of the cruelty, and not the cruelty, but the facts are what they are. And I do think that people have a natural human impulse to be revolted by some of this, you know,
Not only do you not need to be educated about it, you need to be uneducated about it, because if you talk to a child about this stuff, they will instinctively understand how wrong it is. And, and, you know, it's only through a long process of sort of acculturation to it, which includes, you know, when you're a little kid, there's a very typical thing that happens with kids, when they realize that the meat that they've been eating, eating is an animal is that they refuse to eat it, and their parents have to insist and kind of forced them to eat it, to normalize it. And then, you know, after a while, they become acculturated to it. It's the same thing with you know, the the rationales behind animal experimentation, behind the meat industry. There's so many layers of sort of, of how of indoctrination of how we've been taught to perceive of this as normal, that we have to unlearn in order to get back to sort of "naive", quote, unquote, point of view that you would have had as a child and that if you have a child that they probably have, which is like, they just look at it, and they know it's wrong. And that instinct is correct.
Yeah, um, yeah. So this is an interesting point. When you're talking about you said, the meat industry. One of the ideological things that does happen though, is the meat industry is frankly, more aligned with Republicans, I think with conservatives and so there has been that alignment right
Yes, well actually, it's a little bit more complicated than that, because there are two tiers of the meat industry. There's the, the growers, and the ranchers and sort of the people who actually do the animal, raise the animals. And they have one set of interests. And then there's the big conglomerates that have a different set of interests and often a contrary set of interests. So like, the the cattlemen, you know, the American cattle or US Cattlemen Association, or whatever it's called, is, you know, very right wing leaning organization. And a lot of that is cultural. They are up in arms against the big meat packers, because they've been getting squeezed and ripped off. And so have chicken growers. And so there's that there's a conflict of interest between, you know, the, the corporate side of the meat industry, and sort of the farming side, the agricultural side of the meat industry. And as far as those big conglomerates are concerned, I, I honestly don't know if they lean more right or left, I think they're probably like any other lobby where they're just completely politically agnostic, and give to both parties and give more to whoever's in power and, you know, who controls their legislation? But yeah, at the, at the US Cattlemen Association, for example, is certainly very right leaning. But, you know, a lot of that is because it's like Old West stuff. It's like they come from, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's part of the tradition and that part of the world.
Yeah, so I mean, this isn't ideological. It's just like bread and butter in terms of like, who's, you know, how you making money. And as you said, some of the things that industrial agriculture does, you know, it's revolting to people, people don't want to people don't want to see how the sausage is made literally. Yeah, exactly. So, you know, the first 10 minutes, we've been talking about, you know, animal rights and cruelty to animals and all these, you know, you seem, you seem kind of like a bleeding heart guy. You know, but, um, you know, I'm seeing like, you're on Camille Foster's podcast, you're talking to Anna Khachiyan of the Red Scare. You know, you've been mixing it up recently. And, you know, so I told you privately, I do listen to you partly, just because I don't get a sense that you are calculating. I don't get a sense you are reading the room. So like, what what, what is wrong with you? That you don't read the room? Because Am I correct? So my, my impression of the online quote, left, and maybe I'll exclude you know, Jacobin. And some of the really far left people out of this. But let's say like, you know, mainstream, like Elizabeth Warren supporter types, okay. Yeah, they read the room. And so like, why do you not read the room? Like, I mean, why didn't you get on this bandwagon? I mean, it'd be good for your career, wouldn't it,
I actually make an effort not to read the room, I mean, that advice is the worst advice you can possibly get for. Also, from just career oriented point of view, it's actually bad advice. Because if you do read the room, and you end up, you know, with the same political opinions as everybody else, certainly, if you're doing independent journalism, nobody's going to be interested in reading what you have to write or listening to what you have to say, because you know, they get it from every mainstream news source. But also I have made an effort not to read the room, because it is it certainly is easier psychically, right? To just adopt the same sort of same tribal perspectives and not push against the tide. And kind of get in where you fit in and conform is much easier emotionally and psychically, especially when you're on Twitter a lot where, you know, everybody's trying to pick a fight with you all the time. But you know, that that, to me, is corruption. And that that, to me, is what has is, is much of what has happened to the left that I regret and deplore. And so and so yeah, I mean, that's that I am, I try, I try to I discipline myself not to - not to sort of take the temperature of what other people on the left are saying, if I even include myself on the left anymore, which isan open question. In order to continue to exercise independent, critical thought, which is just so lacking nowadays. And politics
was, so you just said that, do you? Or are you even on the left anymore? I mean, what does that even mean? Like, what is the left? Like, what is the left to you? What is the left become like, Tell me some of this stuff? Because I'm not on the left. I don't know. I just kind of observe all of this with confusion and perplexment.
Yeah. Well, when I came into the left, you know, I used to be a labor organizer. It was verykind of classical leftist, you know, as into Marx. I was into, you know, worker power, and I am, I'm still into that.
Right. I just want to tell the listener i You do have a bad academic background in sociology, correct? I do. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So just just so people know that you know, your stuff about that.
Yeah, yeah. And Also I should disclaim that I'm not like some, you know, I don't have dirt my fingertips and I didn't come up on the rank and file. I do come from a cushy background as well. But yeah, I do. I do know my Marx. And, and, but when I got into labor organizing, you know, the left was, at least as I conceived of it was the was the side of ... that was the side that fought against corporate power, and that fought for workers. And I don't believe that that's the case anymore. But I don't think it's so much. I mean, I think it's partially that the left has changed and sort of radical liberal ideology has become the ideology of the elites in America, and smuggled into it is this deep class based disdain for for the poor people who are not in their column, you know, the poor people who like poor people in rural areas and exurban areas? And, and so I that does not resonate with me. And then But then also, I think that there that the whole left, right continuum, it has has, we've moved beyond it, it's it barely has any descriptive value anymore. I think that, you know, I'm a big advocate of MartinGurri's theory. Have you read 'the revolt of the public" yet? Was it?
Yeah, yeah, I have. I mean, everyone who hasn't they should read it. I mean, I like most people read it well, after it was published. But yeah,
Yeah. So So and including the, I think I've read it and like, end of last year or something. And, you know, his his thesis is that there is now a center and periphery on the left and the right, there's the establishment. That concludes the scientific establishment, the political establishment, the cultural establishment, etc. And then there's those who sort of people who are not part of the establishment who spontaneously organize via the internet, against the center. And those are the folks on the periphery. And these movements tend to be sort of like peasant revolts, and that they are undisaplined - that they are unorganized, spontaneous, somewhat incoherent, and tend to be squashed easily, but then sprang up again elsewhere. And so we're seeing like a, there's a coherent ideology within the center. And I think that right now, that's liberal ideology. And then there's this incoherent reaction against the center, from the peripheries, which just flares up and dies down and flares up and dies down, flares up and dies down. And I think that describes our political reality now that the people who aren't like a lot of the people who are considered liberals are really has become just by dint of the fact that a lot of these, despite the fact that the establishment has become liberal, they have become defenders of the center defenders of the status quo. Again, completely contrary to the way that I viewed leftism coming into it. So it's just I don't I don't know what the left is anymore. I don't know if there is such a thing.
Well, so you know, you're using the word liberal and I think non American listeners they have liberal a particular thing in mind, whereas Americans, I think liberal is similar to progressive, but can you differentiate the left and liberal in your own mind? So we understand where you're coming from here?
I mean, it's, uh, I think, in terms of the American usage of liberal you know, liberal just basically is synonymous with leftist and with left in most people's opinions in, in the opinions of people who are self identified as left, they would take issue with that, because they tend to see liberals as sort of the soft, you know, centrist kind of bougie part of their movement and what No, leftists are hardcore and, and, and, you know, they hate the only people that hate more than, than then the right are liberals, you know, People's Front of Judea, that kind of thing. And, and, and so from their definition, there is a split. I think that split has become more and more artificial as you know, there's this term on online RabLib first stands for radical liberal, and that has become that and you know what that means it at least this is kind of how I take it as it's this ideology, which is, which is radical in the sense of like, really radical positions, like abolishing the police, but it's become part of this like, Wine mom discourse, you know, like, soft, centered sort of Elizabeth Warren voting liberals are sympathetic to these extremely radical positions. And so they become kind of conflated into this like RadLib thing, which which which defines the entire left everybody from you know, your Chuck Schumer voters to your Jacobin readers, I don't think that there's a huge difference, like I think there's a monoculture. Now on the left. I don't see a huge spectrum of opinion. On the left. I think there's there's just one designated official set of opinions that most people conform to.
Well, so you just mentioned Elizabeth Warren. Warren, from what I recall you were you not kind of a Warren supporter back in the day.
I mean, I was I was flip flopping between Warren and Bernie. I like neither of them now. But I I was, I voted for Bernie. There were times when - but I didn't. Even when I voted for Bernie. I wasn't a huge fan of his. I had the I know, I liked the Elizabeth Warren's circa. Like, when was it like, you know, 2010 or so when she was, you know, when she was in the Obama administration, running the consumer protection, whatever it's called. I liked that Elizabeth Warren. And I was hoping that she hadn't changed that much. And that that was the one who's running for president. But it wasn't. I mean, there's clearly that wasn't the Elizabeth Warren who's running for president. So the Elizabeth Warren was running for president I do not support. And, and I did vote for Bernie, but I never really liked him to be honest. And I never thought he'd make a good president. I don't think he's a serious person. Certainly not serious as a leader, or as like a legislator. So you know, I'm not I'm not real happy with with it with with any of these folks. But back then I was. I had wishful thinking, you know, I was I was I was hoping that they were what I would like them to be. Well, deep down knowing they weren't.
Yeah, I mean, you know, I'm talking about conversations that I think we had either like, you know, but audio podcast, but also like over Twitter and stuff in 2019. And I got a sense that Zaid was more Bernie and you were more Elizabeth. But that was just my impression.
I think, actually, we did a podcast on it. Where we talked to was talked to Boscarr, who was our Bernie surrogate and Adam Green, who's the one sorry, we had them debated out. This is on the podcast that I had. Yes. I listened to that one. Yeah. But um, but I would say no, Zaid was not. I mean, he was. I don't he didn't vote for Bernie. I don't think.
okay.
He he was in the same. I mean, he was even more. I don't want to speak for him. But I, my recollection is that he was even more sort of disenchanted with the Bernie campaign than I was because he was closer to it. I mean, we both knew people on the Bernie campaign, but he knew more people and knew them better. And the way that campaign was run was just an absolute shit show. It was clear that this was not a serious campaign. It was more serious the first time around, but the second time around, it was a joke.
Yeah. Well, so you know, you're talking, you're talking about how the Bernie campaign is not serious and all that stuff. And yet, you know, let's talk about the left in general, the cultural left or RAD libs, whatever you want to say, you know, what they did in June 2020, with BLM and the cultural changes in the wake of that, even if they're performative are pretty, I don't know, they feel transformative in American society, there's a chill in American society, I feel at least in terms of a demand for conformity. And I mean, where do they get this power? I mean, like, you're describing these shambolic Lee, you know, people's front of Judea versus... the left that I as a Gen X person, I think your Gen X as well, that we've seen, they can't get their shit together. Okay. Like they've never been able to get this. That's the only constant. So what is going on here? Like all of a sudden, there's all these... Yeah, there's just there's just these language changes constantly, you know, to question affirmative action is white supremacy and neocon I mean, just all sorts of just crazy stuff. But it's being platformed. It's being projected by places like the New York Times Washington Post, Nicole Hannah Jones is being sponsored by Shell and she's being self righteous when people like point out that maybe there's a problem with that. I mean, what is going on here?
I mean, I think first of all, this, the left continues to not be able to get his shit together, if you're talking about getting shit together to actually enact a real meaningful program. Because this is this isn't a serious form of politics. And I think that what has happened is that, you know, I think that a lot of it traces back to the 2008 financial collapse. I think that at that time when Occupy Wall Street came up, and the Tea Party on the right, and and these sort of, these movements, indignados, and all these international movements, against sort of financial capital. And, you know, everybody was talking about inequality all the time economic inequality. I think that there was a realization on the part of those in power, that they weren't as secure as maybe that they, they would like to believe they were that there was a real threat of their displacement at the very least of having, you know, hard left leaders elected to heads of state who pass laws that, you know, severely cramp their style, I think that there was a recognition that they needed to adopt a more populist sort of appearance. And, and, by the way, you know, also these corporations tend to be run by people who are, you know, Liberal Democrats, at least in some industries, in a lot of industries in the biggest, most successful industries in tech, and healthcare, and media, education. So this is, you know, this is it's not a it's not a pose, it's not fake, right, this is, this is how they think. But I think also, it has elective affinity with the interests of these organizations to be able to adopt highly cosmetic changes, you know, it's like Ibram Kendi got $10 million from Jack Dorsey, right? He's, he's embraced by all these corporations that, you know, they encourage their employees to read his book, why? If he was truly subversive, would they be encouraging that stuff? No, it's because they're happy to make those kinds of changes. Because those kinds of changes require A) at the most painful, they just require, you know, creating diversity at the top of the of the of those, their leadership, so maybe they have to make some personal changes that they wouldn't have been otherwise. But that's, that's no big deal for a corporation, right, they can find plenty of qualified people of color, with the requisite experience and the requisite education, to take some of those spots. That's not that painful. And then the rest of it is on their workers. And the rest of it is a disciplinary tool that's imposed on workers, these these DI trainings, you know, the these having workers tattletale on each other to HR, about saying offensive things, it's another means of social control have control over their workforce, it's another sort of instrument in the hands of HR departments. So of course, they're not going to complain about that, right? If anything that's useful, that is anywhere between neutral to useful for them. So they don't have a problem with acquiring this ideology. It's great, right? They don't have to do anything. And yet they can claim the mantle of being like, part of the solution of being, you know, like protest, they can raise their fist against the murder of George Floyd. And nobody's asking for them to make any real changes that would actually disrupt their power. So I think it's become the ideology of the elite. And, and, and once that happened, it became hegemonic. Like the left is the the left that the elite has adopted this ideology, and then the left has become the controlled opposition. They're not or they're not even the opposition anymore. They're pro corporate, because if the if the corporation is woke, they're going to be on your side, you know, Colin Kaepernick is somebody tweeted about how Colin was a you who tweeted about Colin Kaepernick making you know, Uighurs sneakers, while he's protesting, you know, economic injustice and racial injustice in America. You know, it's it's a joke. It's like it's become a pro corporate movement.
Well, yeah, there's, I personally do find it to be farcical. But people are quite serious. And they keep a straight face on this on this stuff. So in your personal experience, or in your perception, do you think that the people actually are keeping a straight face? Because they're having to do it? Or they actually believe this?
You mean, do you mean, like the activists or the executives?
Executives -I think I know what's going on. Yeah, activists.
Ah, yeah. I mean, a lot of them are true believers, for sure. And that's not too surprising, because they have it has worked well for them. Right. Like, I mean, there's a whole industry around DI, it's a huge - I wish an economist would sit down and like actually, like, measure the size of this industry, maybe somebody has, and I'm not aware of it. But I believe that it's vast. It's a vast industry. And I'm not saying that people are doing this, that these activists are doing this for money or jobs or this, that's to crude. You know, they do believe themselves to be agents of change. They do believe in what they're doing. But what they're doing happens to be working out very well for them. And so far as, you know, there's financial security in it. There's, there's a big platform in it, there's huge influence in it, there's, you know, a lot of attention that they wouldn't get otherwise in it, you know, they can have they can demand meetings with CEOs of huge corporations to get them and have the CEO panders to them. You know, this is like, this activist wet dream. I can't do that around animal rights. I can't get Tyson a meeting with Tyson let alone out and pander to me. You know, like who who has that power and the activist left? Other than, you know, this sort of cultural stuff that doesn't actually constrain anybody's power. So it's working very well for the activists. So it's a self affirming thing. It's working out well, for the executives whose power they are not challenging. It's working Well for everybody, you know, so it's a happy family.
Yeah, I mean, I guess after a fashion, but I mean, you, you and Glenn Greenwald, you know, Matt Taibbi be some of the, you know, some of you guys. Sometimes like pretty standard neoliberal shills like Matt Yglesias are standing against this. Now, do you think that this is just like, candidly, do you just think this is, you know, the last gasp of older millennials and Gen X, and you know, this is going to be the new religion, the new regnant order? Or do you think that this is going to exhaust itself?
Ah, I am weary about predicting the future, I cannot imagine that this is sustainable for too much longer. I don't think that is just a generational thing. I think that this was an expression of, first of all, I think that this was an expression of a specific generation, I've written about millennials, who, who came out of college and into the labor market when the labor market had been destroyed. And these were, you know, there were these were people with liberal arts education. I mean, that sort of elite tier came in with like, four year liberal arts education, expectations of a, you know, illustrious, well compensated career, and then they ended up being interns of unpaid interns for years, you know, the whole, like, kind of what, what that show "Girls" parodies and, and I think it made them bitter, and an angry with the world, and, and sort of a extrapolated their sense of personal injustice, to the injustice of people who truly experience real injustice. And, and so it shaped I think it's an attitude of a specific generation. So therefore, it's ephemeral. I also think that there's clearly a backlash to it. I mean, the the this election yesterday, is, there'll be many post mortems. But but, you know, I think that it's pretty resounding in terms of the backlash to it, so I don't think it's gonna die. You know, I think it's got a long future ahead of it. But I don't believe that it will be hegemonic. I think that's something we'll replace it. I don't know what it is.
Okay, so, since you're a journalist, I'm kind of curious where you think this is coming from. But I one thing I've noticed recently, in online, more liberal, maybe RabLib spaces, journalism, academia, nonprofits institutions, is there's this idea of social contagion. Where, so so and so talk to so and so who talked to so and so and that's problematic, right? So it's like the transitivity of ritual pollution.
Yes, the cooties. Yeah.
Okay, I mean, I'm laughing because whenever I see this, I always think, Wait, are we in eighth grade? But people do this? No, but they do this with a straight face, and seriously all the time as adults? So it was a what is going on here? I mean, is it my imagination that people did do this as much like 10 years ago? It's just like a new thing.
It's your imagination? All? I think it's true. I mean, I think probably people did it to some extent, you know, for, you know, as long as we've been having these debates, but I think it's certainly very, very much more pronounced. Now. You know, it's just, it's a logical extension of identity politics, you know, when you when you win a debate based on - not the strength of your argument, but based on your identity characteristics, your immutable characteristics, and what category what bucket that puts you in, then it's just an extension of that logic that like, if you are, you know, that that, that we're focused on people, and how valuable they are, how how virtuous they are, or how unvirtuous they are not debates and arguments. So, you know, if you can win an argument by appealing to your own identity, then you can also win an argument by appealing to somebodies association with somebody else with a, you know, who's stigmatized. And I've had that. I've had that experience many, many times, you know, like, oh, well, you're, you're making the same argument that Joe Rogan made, like people will say that, like, well, you can make the same argument Joe Rogan made is if that's relevant to anything, you know, yeah, I happen to like Joe Rogan, by the way, but it's like, it's like, oh, because somebody, you know, obviously, it's much more apparent with Trump, right? Trump says something correct. Once every year, you know, he happens to make an observation which rings true and then you're not allowed to have that opinion. That's what happened with the lab leak stuff, right? We weren't allowed to entertain the lively hypothesis because Trump talked about it. You know, we weren't allowed to talk about hydroxychloroquine because Trump talked about it. Hydroxychloroquine has been debunked as a as an effective medicine, but it was being used by doctors for, you know, for at the beginning of the COVID Spike. It's not like, you know, some Alex Jones power pill thing it didn't like come out of nowhere. But once Trump started talking about it, you couldn't even entertain the idea that it has any medical validity. So, you know, like, it's a stupid, stupid, stupid way to have a debate and to perceive reality, but that's where we are.
But so when you I'm just curious, in journalistic circles, when you tell people this, like, what do they say?
I don't, I don't know what somebody would say who I would have that argument with who would disagree with me. I mean, just like everybody, right? Like I'm, I'm also in a, in a silo of a sort. I'm exposed, because this sort of RadLib ideology is, so hegemonic, of course, I'm exposed to it, it's just in the air, it's in the ether. You know, I just breathe it every day. But, you know, my own people who I talk to most frequently are much more like me. heterodox, and then I also have a lot of people who, you know, I used to be, well, I will say this, there are other people who I have a lot of affection for, and respect for who I, I am reluctant to even talk about this stuff with, because I don't know whether they are on the woke bandwagon or not. A lot of them aren't, I mean, I know a lot of normal ass people who are in my life who I've heard, who I've never considered political, who I hear are, like, really fed up with a stuff and I know, like, I That surprises me. Because I would think that you have to be kind of, in your, like, surrounded by this stuff, to least reach that level of frustration, but it's everywhere. Like, it's like, it's in the workplace, it's in, you know, it's in politically secular places, a political spaces. So everybody's being exposed to it. But you know, but but, but I'm also afraid that those people who I like and respect and have affection for, you know, are going to immediately judge me as being, you know, a deplorable or something, because I disagree with this ideology. And that's sad, it was pathetic. And it's sad that we're at that point, like, a will, if you disagree with the party line, then you're a bad person, I can't like you anymore. But I think that to a certain extent, I'm afraid that that's the reality.
Well, I mean, I think like, the polarization is pretty extreme here. So if you're not with us, you're against us. It's that sort of mentality that you're kind of alluding to, right. So if you deviate in any way, you're, you're thrown out of the club, right?
I do tend to believe that a lot. A lot of people, I tend to believe this because I again, like I've talked to like, there's this one person who's a good friend of mine, who's a journalist, and, you know, she's, she's perfectly positioned to be extremely woke. And, and, you know, we had a coffee together, and she kind of confided in me that she's become in her in her description, much more conservative, she's always been a lefty, and she's considered her self much more conservative. Now, I don't know that she's actually much more conservative. I think she's just, you know, sane, and reasonable. And, and doesn't subscribe to the - doesn't, isn't jumping to the place where the left has jumped just like me. But you know, she kind of confided that in me. And so there's, like, I tend to believe - and I, that's not the first time that that's happened, I tend to believe that there's a lot of people who are just, you know, I hate to use the analogy to the Nixon and stuff. But like the silent majority, you know, people are, they're afraid to pipe up about it. But privately, they like have deep, deep, deep skepticism about this culture. And then the big loud mouths who account for a very small percentage of the population is dominate the debate. And, and part of their part of their set of tactics is to make people feel afraid of voicing a different point of view. So you get the skewed picture of how many people actually believe this stuff.
Mm hmm. Well, I you know, I'm just asking you these questions, because, you know, I talked to you two years ago, and, you know, I think things have really progressed, so to speak in a descriptive sense, and I just just want to know how you feel right now, because, you know, you you probably haven't really changed but, you know, I, I don't know, are you a problematic person? Like, how do people talk about you now? Like, I mean, do they? I mean, look at what happened, what's happened to Glenn Greenwald,
Right, right. Yeah. I, I'm sure that I am in the, in the, in the opinions of many people who know me or like acquaintances of mine. I haven't gotten that to my face as much as like, both obviously, not as much as Glenn because I don't have a million followers on Twitter and etc. But also Glenn is much more forceful about it. I you know, I'm by nature, like I have strong opinions, and I have and I get very frustrated with stuff. And I sometimes resort maybe often resort to sarcasm. And, and and, you know, mean spiritedness when I'm criticizing this ideology. But I also have a side of me that tries to be very careful not to say anything that I can't - don't feel 100% Sure I can defend in a good faith argument. Now, I'm not I'm not saying Glenn's not that way he can defend everything that he says. He's very good at defending everything that he says. But I, but that part of me, I think does restrain me somewhat, so that I'm not quite as in your face as somebody else might be. So I'm not I don't troll people, you know, I don't I don't try to elicit this reaction, I just say what I believe and if people challenge me on it, then I will attempt to have a good faith conversation with them. And if they immediately start calling me names, or you know, resorting to bad faith arguments, then I usually just block them or, you know, on twitter or just walk away from the conversation. But I'm not as provocative as others, I think at least.
Well, let me Um, let me try to ask you then maybe a provocative question. Because, you know, I'm in I'm in certain spaces, more conservative spaces, but not exclusively conservative. And, you know, we've we talked about, you know, so I have a lot of friends in academia, okay. And so there are people who have views, they have to be quiet about, you know, they know that their promotions, their tenure, everything probably does pass an ideological litmus test, because the DEI environment and academia is such that deviation from DEI is a Title X violation, that sort of thing. Right? Yeah. And I know, people who have actually been pushed out of academia for various reasons. They're pretty ideological, political, Yeah, those sorts of things. Right. So um, and one thing that many of us talk about, is, there's a gendered aspect to some of this. And I just wonder, like, what you think about that, you don't need to answer the question if you don't want to answer the question. But I'm in terms of the way men and women talk with each other. And just in terms of the demand for conformity, so I feel that, you know, with men are social, just we socialize with each other in a way where we're very self deprecating, and there's a lot of differences of views. But ultimately, it is what it is. Whereas with women's like social groups, there tends to be more demand for some sort of like, you know, everyone's on the same page. And as professions get more and more gender balance, those values come into many disciplines and professions. I mean, what do you think about that hypothesis?
You know, I've never ever thought about it. So. So anything that any reaction I have to it is totally half baked, and thinking out loud. I, you know, I don't know. I, I, I wonder whether that's the case. I hear what you're saying. But in 2021, do you think it's the case with women that that they tend to sort of have a tendency to seek consensus, and therefore conformity more than men? I mean, I wonder not just because women have become, you know, more sort of been ascended to more leadership positions and can aspire to more leadership positions the same way as men, so don't have to just like go along, get along, but also men have changed.
Mm hmm. Yeah. No, I mean, I think that's true, but I just bring it up. Because I know things like in law schools, kind of the adversarial, acerbic interactions have apparently been discouraged because of the I don't know. I mean, look, a lot of law professors are assholes. And they've been, they've been like that for decades. And apparently, they're getting feedback. Don't do that. Like, you know, people are crying things are happening. And, you know, I mean, if it was like, a bunch of dudes, honestly, like, if a dude is crying, no one cares, you know. So I'm just bringing that up, just because it's something that we've talked about privately. And it's something that I wonder about, like, what is driving this? Are there demographic changes, because everything is about identity and demographics now , I mean, it shouldn't be, you know, in my opinion, it shouldn't be but it is like, you notice these things. I mean, another thing is, you know, we have Ibram X Kendi. And, you know, he gets a MacArthur Genius and all this stuff. And to be entirely candid, I think this is kind of a joke. He's a he's a lightweight, um, I think, to be entirely candid, it's almost racist. It's racist.
Oh, yeah. Yes. Agree.
And so, we just, we live in this like, kind of like this fun house of, of lies and delusions, and, you know, how long can this sustain itself and you know, I do remind myself Soviet communism sustained itself for 70 years. So it can sustain itself for a while, but um, you know, No, I, you know, I like talking to you Leighton. I mean, I think a lot of people follow you on Twitter partly because someone like you because people start to wonder if they're crazy.
I think I think what you said about it being racist is really the most offensive thing to me about this ideology, because so this whole notion that if you are POC or BIPOC, a word I learned from you, by the way, long ago when it was first. You were joking. I literally thought you're making a joke.
Oh, wait, are you? Are you trying to say that I'm like a woke pioneer,
You knew bipoc before I did, but uh, but anyway, the notion that people in these protected classes are so fragile, that not only would they just be, you know, fatally injured by hearing, by hearing offense, truly, actually offensive things, but that even by hearing opinions that are other than their own, you know, like this Yale thing with the Federalist Society, you know, that the idea that these are such fragile creatures that to hear an opinion that they disagree with, might throw them into, like, you know, into a nervous breakdown or something. It's just so deeply infantilizing. And it's pointed at non white people, right? I find that to be deeply, deeply, deeply racist. I mean, that and it goes back to the old racist tropes about about non white people being like children and white people being like adults, and you know, the adults have to either discipline the kids or, you know, paternalistically take care of the those children. You know, this is an old trope, and now it's been kind of repackaged into into a virtue.
It's actually anti racist now. Yeah, exactly. Well, it's, I mean, that so I guess what you're alluding to here is, there's a little bit of like noble savage trope coming coming here where, you know, all the bad things in the world are from white people. And before white people introduced all the bad things, everything was fine and perfect and dandy, right? There's ahistorical aspect to it. And, you know, I get frustrated where it's like, okay, these people don't know any history. So we're talking about 1619 project and all these things that people actually read the histories, I'd be kind of, okay, because we can have a discussion, but I feel like there are these crazy theories that are being propounded, and people just make these crazy inferences. And you know, you as an academic out of social science, humanities background, how you feel about like the intellectual state of American discourse today.
It's, it's, it's so pathetic. It's I mean, I wrote about this thing for Barry Weiss about what I FOIA'ed or I public records requested this document from my old department at UC Berkeley, the sociology department. And the grad students first part of their deep dig, they got a grant to be able to put into play some DEI program. And one of the things that they're doing is they're they're forming a committee of grad students and some professors, no doubt the like the wokest professors to form a committee to review the syllabi of all the professor's what they're teaching at the graduate and the undergraduate level to make sure that it is in conformity with this ideology. You know what one of the phrases is that they want to make sure that that writers of color are proportionally represented, which I think is ridiculous, but I have a little bit more sympathy for it, then for the - this next argument, but like they, it also states that they want to make sure that something about like that the curriculum is in conformity with sociologies historical commitment to anti racism. And it doesn't take much to read between the lines to know that what it means is that, you know, this has to be in accord with - with today's 2021 conception of anti racism. So it's a committee reviewing syllabi to make sure that it is, you know, politically correct, that it's in conformity with a party line. That is a that is a poison pill, which will destroy academia if it's allowed to persist.
Yeah, I mean, that sounds right. So I have a question for you. So you know, you know, I have a lot of friends in academia. You know, I'm, in a way, I'm still academia adjacent with some of my work in biotech and stuff. And a lot of academics are flipping out that, you know, in certain red states, there are certain demands now being made counter attacks on academic freedom. And I'm like, Okay, I see what you're saying. But like, you guys don't really have academic freedom. Yeah, I mean, I mean, what do you say? I mean, what do you think? I mean, do you think this because like, I'm just like, I'm not even gonna say it to you. I know how many people are terrified about like, you know, The bottom up enforcement of monoculture, like what do you mean? No one, no one thinks you're actually like, under threat because you don't have what's under threat anyway?
You mean me personally?
No, no, I'm just talking about academics in general. I mean, you know, you get do you think, do you think in your experience? Are they aware of how they seem?
Ah, you know, I'm not as academic adjacent as your although recently I've, I've, I've made daily steps back into being in touch with, with some professors from my old department. I think that my brother is a college professor as well. And I think he's at Northwestern where the work in this thing happened. But I tend, I think that, you know, I think that there are the true believer professors who are up in arms about, you know, who like, I actually know, somebody who was a professor Middlebury who was organizing with the students on that, that really deplorable protest against Charles Murray, where a professor was attacked, and, you know, physically attacked. And, and so they're, you know, they're super woke professors for sure. And then I think that there are a lot of professors who are just like, like the same as people in every other profession, who are just keeping their heads down. And you know, and muttering quietly about it to each other in private. But, but the new jack generation that comes up, you know, the grad students who are forming these committees to review the syllabi of the professors are going to be professors in about, you know, yeah, probably five to eight years from now. Yeah. So, you know, so what, what academia will look like then? I think it'll be unrecognizable.
Yeah. Well, I mean, so you just said something that I think can be seen to be extremely problematic. You mentioned Charles Murray, but you didn't do the pro forma denunciation and I really think you should account for yourself and explain explain your thinking.
Well, I didn't want to I didn't want to harp on it, because I'm trying not to center whiteness. I actually don't know much about Charles Murray. I know that the Bell - I remember I was in when the bell curve came out was like, but first year I was I was in grad school, and I never read it. I just thought it was a bad book, you know, because that was? And you know, it probably, maybe it is maybe it isn't? I don't know, I would have to read it first. I'm sure I disagree with Charles Murray on a whole lot of things. And I probably agree with him on some other things. But
wait, wait, wait, did did you just say you agreed with Charles Murray on some other things?
Well, I Yeah. Because my understanding is that he's got this whole line of thought about how people should not be penalized for being cognitively deficient, right, and that we reward people for their inherent intelligence by birth, they're financially rewarded. There were social prestige, and that that's a form of injustice that we don't recognize. I think that's a, you know, very egalitarian point of view, where he connects it to race. I would probably, well, certainly if the caricature what he says is true that I radically different from him, but I you know, I'm not prepared to believe that that radical that that character is true. But it you know, if it's more nuanced than that, I probably still disagree with him, because I think race is just a fiction. And I doubt that he believes that. But, but, you know, this is all a long winded way of saying that, how much I agree with him or disagree with him is fucking irrelevant to like, you're talking about the Middlebury thing, right? Yeah. Like you don't shut down speech through violence, you know, no matter how much you object to the speech in question. You know, it's just like, it's preposterous. And of course, the first thing that people reach to is like, Well, what about Hitler's speaking, you know, okay, that's a, that's a whole unique set of set of circumstances. But it is much more likely that the person who's going to get shut down is much closer to you know, some like moderate centrist is much closer to Charles Murray than Hitler is, you know, so like, taking to that extreme is just kind of the lie that proves the truth of this sort of the illiberalism of this, this whole exercise.
Well, so I, you know, I want to close up asking you about Red Scare, and Aimee Terese and all these online leftist because not my world. But before I do that, I do want to mention something that some listeners might find amusing. I reviewed Charles Murray's latest book for Quilette And I didn't really want to review it because I'm friends with Charles. And I don't like to review books by friends. I asked so Quilette asked me to find someone to review the book. I asked 10 people, they, they could not review the book.
They just wouldn't touch it. To dangerous.
Whether it's positive or negative, they cannot be seen to have read the book
right or more those mostly white People,
a mix was mostly white, but there were some non whites as well. And that the people like, you know, like Wilfred Riley reviewed the book for commentary. But I did approach Wilfred and he said, I'm reviewing the book for commentary. I'm like, damn it, like the black guy who would review the book, you know,
I was I was, I was the book, I gave
it a mixed review to be frank, because so his latest book doesn't really have anything new or, you know, decisive. It's just like, you know, just like standard data and statistics, and maybe people need it. Maybe people don't? Yeah, I don't know. Charles is old, he's retired, he can do what he wants to. And, you know, it's like, okay, that's it's a fine book. It's short. But I don't think it adds, I honestly don't think it adds a lot of value for a lot of the audience that will read it. Right. Maybe, maybe it'll add some value for the audience that wouldn't read it. So does that make sense?
Yeah, it's actually yeah, all the people who most need to be exposed to certain types of certain arguments are the ones who are least likely to consume it because it's like, forbidden.
Yeah. And like, you know, I will say, like, uh, you know, actually, like, inspired by you and Zaid . A couple of years ago, I wrote an article in national review, saying that conservatives should embrace evolution, like, my whole point was like, Well, you know, like, I have some credibility in conservative circles. And I do evolution and stuff like that. And I think this creationist stuff is stupid. There was something in the Federalist, I tried to pitch it to the Federalist, the editor there, spiked it, like, it was quite obvious in hindsight, she was never going to publish it. So I took it into national review, they published it, and then I got denounced by David Klinghoffer at the Creationist Discovery Institute, as a Nazi, and then I also got denounced by left wing scientist for writing a National Review, which is an evil homophobic. So, you know, that's the lesson I took from empirical lesson I took from like, trying to, like, you know, speak to people who might not always hear a message.
Yeah, yeah. And, you know, speaking of Charles Murray being verboten, you know, the slippery slope, which used to be a fallacy, but as clearly, you know, more and more true every day, has slipped to the point where I was listening to Michael Shellenberger in his interview with Joe Rogan. And you know, his book, he won't get he can't get reviewed anywhere. You know, he is a old school lefty guy who has who is critical of the doctrinaire sort of way that... I want to read this book. I haven't read it yet. But it sounds great, because he takes it further than the critique has gone so far, with like people critiquing sort of the intellectual conformity and the ideological sort of the, the punishments for for transgressing ideology. And he's looked at how this is played out in actually governing cities and actually trying to solve real problems, and how it hinders our ability to be able to tackle things like homelessness. So this is just a pragmatic book by a guy who is socially liberal. But because he is not Orthodox, New York Times, which has reviewed his books before won't review this book, he can't get anyone anywhere to review his book. It's like, this is this is the danger of this kind of culture. You know, this is like, this is a book that is hardly, you know, radical. That's hardly, like, it's not even like a book that's.... it's not even like an Ann Coulter thing trying to troll people. It's just simply an argument, you know, simply an argument with a lots of reporting behind it. It's verbotten.
Yeah, I mean, I think we could we could, we could talk for a long time about the way the culture and the media seem to be kind of restricting the space of possible answers to any given question. In fact, there's only one answer. And, you know "We believe in science, and we trust the experts and all this stuff" Right. But like, you were on a podcast with Anna Kachikyan. How do you say her last name? The Red Scare? Yeah, sorry. I'm not I'm not really good with non American names just
Because you're racist!
Yeah and, yeah, so and so. I do listen to Red Scare sometimes. And I used to listen to Chapo, they're a little repetitive, not gonna lie. I listen to these online lefty lefty people sometimes, partly because, as you kind of implied earlier, the RadLib like kind of like the mainstream Normie perspective is just so boring and so predictable. There's just really no point listening to it. So sometimes they kind of like say what they think and all this stuff. But what is the future of this sort of like edgy dirtbag leftism, as they used to call it in the late teens? I mean, like I think Aimee Teresa, who's kind of like a minor online left person is kind of just come out and said she's not left anymore from what I've heard. And I I get that sense from you know, Red Scare sometimes too. where there's just more socially conservative or more socially normal? I don't know what's going on here like are they all gonna like become Neo cons? not Neo cons of invade the world like you know all that but like the old 1970s Where liberals were mugged by reality or something I don't know I'm just kind of curious because when I listen I'm like yeah, like you guys are making fun of the same people I laugh at but you know, we're not on the same side so like what's going on here? Well, first
of all, Anna would be very dismayed to hear you group her group Red Scare with Chapo Trap House. Even though a lot of people make that association. They're they're they're actually Worlds Apart. Chapo, I think has become I stopped listening to it a couple years ago. So I can't speak with with too much familiarity, but I believe that they become quite banal in terms of their politics. I know they, they they swear and they say mean things about people - about people and that's what sets them apart. But otherwise, it just means you know, pod save America politics in maybe worse because they also I feel like they have this just deep seated, even though they they're self avowed socialists, they have this deep seated contempt for regular people. They make fun of regular Americans all the time. And, you know, in a really condescending, contemptuous way, in a way that by the way, Anna and Dasha do not. So I think those are different categories. But but so dirtbag left, I don't - like the Chapo folks. I don't know what will happen to him. I don't frankly care what happens with them. I hope that they lose influence because I don't think that they have a good influence on the discourse whatsoever. People who I would put in a different category like Anna and Dasha, Angela Nagel, Amber Frost, ironically, because she is on Chapo but yeah, I really liked her and she's - I guess I'm putting her in different category than shop ironically, but I I'm a big fan of hers. Glenn Matt Taibbi, Lee Fong, Zaid. You know, folks like that, - Camille, you know, we, we all i We're all most of us are in touch with each other, and are friendly with each other or are in dialogue with each other. And we are all heterodox, and I believe that it I think that it would be a tragedy if we became a tribe. You know, it's like we and other like minded people that came yet another political sect,
IDW v2 the next generation.
So, you know, that would be the worst thing because really what we're reacting you know, I think what we all have a distaste for is the tribalism that is taken over the left. So you know, there's a real so like, people do ask, like, you know, when people ask what this what the name should be for this kind of new like, quote, unquote, "post left" movement, it shouldn't have a name like that would be the first mistake is giving it a name. Because once you have a name, you have a brand, you have a brand that you have to defend. You have detractors that you have to defend against the those detractors are official bad guys. You can't share an opinion with them, you know, what all the tribal incentive structures come to bear. So I've just not left I'm not right. I'm I believe that I'm populist in nature. That's what brought me to the left in the first place. And it's what its part in is partly what has distanced me from the left now because I think the left has become so elitist. So I have populist instincts. But beyond that, I just I don't I try not to put myself into any category.
No Labels, no labels Leighton
No labels man
All right. Um, you know, I like talking to you. I think the listeners can get that it's just because, you know, you're not speaking cliches. You do try to think for yourself. You know, we like the standard thing. Like, I don't agree, you know, it's like, you know, what I don't like Leighton. I don't like it when people are just like, I don't agree with this person with everything they say. But the right on this, and I'm just like, right. Do you agree with everything that they say? Like, what does that mean?
you have to disclaim that?
Yeah, so I tend not to do that.
apologizing for agreeing with them on something. Yeah. I
mean, it's like, it's not about the person. It's about what they're saying. Right. You know, and I think I think that's the key. And I think that's the key. Whatever, whatever disagreements ideological disagreements people have, if it was based on reality, on material conditions on things that are happening in the world, I think it's much more concrete and easy to actually understand what the source of the good disagreement is, aside from pure tribalism. So one of my friends I mean, I do consider this guy a friend still, you know, he's an academic, and I've known him I don't know, I've known him for 15 years now. And he always responds and quote tweets. Zaid in a very, very, you know, snarky way, but I also know this guy's politics. He's a Normie Democrat, he's better normally get Democrat like Hillary 2008 You know, this sort of stuff. Like he's very like moderate centrist. But it's really really weird to me because he just like tries to- he dunks on Zaid all the time like he's he's a republican shill and I'm like, Dude, do you know what this guy is about? Do you know the things that he said in the early teens that got him in trouble with Center for America? And actually, he didn't know. He didn't know. He's like, Oh, like, that's weird. I didn't know that. Right? You know, it's just, it's just interesting. How, you know, because you don't fit into a box. People that are in the box, just like are standing up there looking down on you. I don't know, it's very
They force you into boxes, do you just pick on this two dimensional character and you have to be, you know, slotted into a certain category. And so you know, yeah.
Well, it was great talking to you and just like status update. It's been a couple of years. Maybe Maybe I'll like reach out in a couple of years. And you know, we're gonna we're gonna have a discussion from the bunker.
reeducation camp. Yeah, yeah.
So you know, like I'm in I'm in camp 13 You're at Camp 17 And we're using you know and like the Red Scare girls are broadcasting from Russia I mean,
Love it. Can't wait.
I mean, we were joking but you know, who knows but anyways, it's great talking to you like
