Canada Mike joins Emmet to talk about the second to last chapter of Lasch's book. They talk about how liberalism went from a political position to an alleged psychological framework and culture. And how HL Mencken was a pioneer of lectureporn. Special Guest: Mike.
DF and Emmet had such a good time talking about early internet history they decided to do it again. This time, they're looking at humdog's seminal but half-forgotten essay "pandora's vox." DF and Emmet try to work through the internet as a form, it's incredible liquidity, how physical space has transubstantiated into the internet, things like the Slaves of Gor fandom as a substructure of the internet, what it means that humdog seems to have committed suicide over exactly the kind of relationship...
Default Friend returns to talk with Emmet about Julian Dibbel's famous essay, A Rape in Cybserpace , which presaged our digital social experience back in 1993. DF and Emmet talk about etiquette, digital governance, the weirdness of online life, the "distributed self," what it would mean to take the internet seriously, and more! Subscribe to our Patreon to get two exclusive episodes a month! Closing Song: The End of Love by Wimeanancas Cambodian Band....
Emmet and John begin their new series on Robert Hughes's documentary series The Shock of the New. This first installment takes on early modernism. The lads contemplate the impact of WWI, think on what really separates the modern experience from previous eras, and what makes our era different from early modernism. Shock of the New . Subscribe to our Patreon to get 2 exclusive episodes a month! Nuclear Barbarians. Closing Song: Chlorine by Buffalo Buffalo....
Anton Jager sits down with Emmet to talk about how we moved from the post-political age of technocratic consensus to the noisy stasis of our current hyper-political present. They talk about whether the right and left descriptors handed down from French parliament hold today, politics as fandom, the death of political responsibility, and more! How the World Went from Post-Politics to Hyper-Politics by Anton Jaegar, Tribune. Subscribe to our Patreon to get two exclusive episodes a month and access...
Emmet and John take on the ideas of Reinhold Niebuhr and his impact on neocons and MLK. Then they look at Lasch's interpretation of MLK's intellectual life and political career. They compare the Southern and Northern Civil Rights campaigns and contemplate the deadlock, in part created by King himself, left in his wake. They close by discussing resentment and its politics. This is a teaser, subscribe to the Patreon to hear the rest!
Luke Thompson returns to talk with Emmet about Joan Didion, who recently passed. They focus on her essay "Insider Baseball," her coverage of the 1988 presidential primary season, and discuss the nature of American presidential campaigns, the campaign press, the nature of Didion's insights, what made 2016 so weird, and more! Insider Baseball by Joan Didion . Closing Song: "Journey to the Darkened Empires" by Forlorn Kingdom ....
Emmet and Mike discuss medieval techniques of memory and forgetting. They discuss Cornelius Agrippa's assault on those techniques as an assault on the corrupted scholastic world. In Agrippa's thought we see the germs of modernity. The discuss opens up into a contemplation of ancient science and tech, the propaganda of the Enlightenment, the disciplining of the mind and the gaze, recovering tradition, and more. Feel free to email or DM us for pdfs of the sources we used for this episode. Subscrib...
Emmet and John work through questions of the democratization of work and culture in the era of mass production and mass culture. They also trace the relationship between cultural bohemians and elites with the workers' movement, including the forgotten legacy of Mabel Dodge Luhan. The close by talking about national loyalty, the repeat of debates from 100 years ago, another look at property as a political concern, and more! Subscribe to our Patreon to hear the rest and get two exclusive episodes ...
Emmet and returning guest Josh Bregman sit down to talk about the movie Looper. They look back at what makes it such a successful film, but also what it captured about the year it was released, 2012. They talk about Mark Fisher, life before social media, "the slow cancellation of the future," what kind of interregnum we're in, and what Looper had to tell us about our future. Subscribe to our Patreon for two exclusive episodes a month! Closing Song: Free Nation - Naked Raygun....
Emmet and Mike talk about Agamben's book, Where Are We Now?: The Epidemic as Politics, and reflect on life since the pandemic. They discuss Carl Schmitt, security theater, anti-social civics, the cultic gnosticism of scientific faith, the need for physical practices and spiritual mentors, bare life, their own intellectual failings during the pandemic, and more. Subscribe to the Patreon to get two exclusive episodes a month! Check out Emmet's new podcast and newsletter, Nuclear Barbarians . Closi...
This is a teaser! Subscribe to our Patreon to get the rest, plus two exclusive episodes a month. We return to our Lasch series and talk about Georges Sorel and the syndicalist moment in the late 19th and early 20th century. Property, proprietorship, and centralization are the major themes of the chapter. We brought some of these issues into the present by discussing control over one's data, discretion as empowerment, and selective quietude as rebellion....
Professor of film and media studies and author of Virtue Hoarders: The Case Against the Professional Managerial Class , Catherine Liu joins Emmet to talk about the death of the humanities in higher ed, the meritocratic nightmare of Common Core, why the humanities are important, the HRification of everything, and more! The Apotheosis of the Professional Class by Catherine Liu , Catalyst. Subscribe to our Patreon to get two exclusive episodes a month! Closing Song: Shimmering Neck by Landowner....
Contributing editor at Unherd Mary Harrington joins Emmet to talk about why everything feels like porn, the smooth hell of life online, the culture of fear in the time of COVID, how women get forgotten, and more! Read Mary Harrington's work at Unherd. Mary's website. Subscribe to our Patreon to get two exclusive episodes a month!...
Emmet and Mike hash out MacIntyre's provocative lecture at Notre Dame's conference on the idea of human dignity in the secular age last month. They go through the essentials of MacIntyre's argumentation, reflect on its implications, then consider Abrahamic Law more broadly. Mike brings a Muslim perspective to bear and they both ask how we are to live with fidelity in a world where nothing feels possible. This is a teaser. To listen to the rest subscribe to our Patreon and get two exclusive episo...
River Page joins Emmet to talk about the new woke institutions and how they reify previously existing class structures. They go into standpoint theory, identity politics, the CIA's relationship to the New Left, PMC projections of the working class's soul, and much more. They close by contemplating the possibility of a better left populism. The Standpoint Bureaucracy by River Page, Twink Revolution The CIA and the New Dialect of Power by River Page, American Affairs River's Substack. Subscribe to...
Canada Mike and Emmet take a look at three pieces to consider different lenses for human development. The first is an essay on Engels by Wolfgang Streeck , the second is a lecture on thermoeconomics by John Constable , and the t hird is an overview of arguments for human evolution by Michael E. Mann . Emmet and Mike touch on the Meiji restoration, why we should read old thinkers, British coal, why Steven Pinker sucks, what kind of revolution was the Industrial Revolution, civilizational skillset...
Emmet and John forge ahead through the longest and most difficult chapter in Lasch's The True And Only Heaven. They question his use of Thomas Carlyle, delve into the Calvinism in both Carlyle and Emerson, what it means for America to have an anti-progressive tradition, Boethius's Wheel of Fortune, appreciating fate, and more! Subscribe to the Patreon to here the rest!
Emmet sat down with Joseph Keegin to talk about his pice for Tablet, The High Church of Wokeism, which traces certain elements of woke ideology back to Unitarian Universalism. They talk about the unacknowledged power of divinity schools in shaping American progressivism, repairing the "broken middle," identity talk as soul talk, and much more. The High Church of Wokeism by Joseph Keegin, Tablet. Subscribe to our Patreon to get two exclusive episodes a month. Closing Song: Memorial by Moss Icon....
Emmet sits down with Percy Menzies of Assisted Recovery Centers of America to talk about the opioid epidemic in America. Percy walks through the history of opioids, how OxyContin changed everything, and how fentanyl has changed everything again. He and Emmet discuss misunderstandings about addiction, the forces aligned against solving the crisis--including the methadone lobby--treating the whole person, and more. If you'd like to get in touch with Percy with questions, comments, or support, you ...
Emmet and John dive into Lasch's overview of populism. They start to get glimpses of Lasch's commitments here. Touring classical conceptions of republicanism to people like Paine, Cobbett, and Brownson, Emmet and John track how they frustrate our contemporary interpretations of republicanism and liberalism can't or don't apply to them. Thinking with Lasch on historiography, they close the chapter discussing 19th-century artisans, populism, the New Deal, and the triumph of Taylorism. This is a te...
Writer and philosopher Oliver Traldi sits down with Emmet to talk about what it means to be a public intellectual today, what being a writer's really like, CRT, how woke politicization has homogenized every other endeavor in the humanities, and more! Clean Rooms and Dirtbags by Oliver Traldi, American Affairs. What's In A Name? by Oliver Traldi, Arc Digital Subscribe to our Patreon to get two exclusive episodes a month! Closing Song: Garbage Man by Chat Pile ....
Default Friend returns to ex.haust to talk about the death of sex positivity, the coming wave of sex negativity, affinity community online, how our identities are formed now, and a whole bunch of other stuff. The Coming Wave of Sex Negativity by Default Friend Affinity vs. Experience by Default Friend Subscribe to our Patreon to get 2 exclusive episodes a month! Closing Song: I Can My Heart Touching You by Parannoul...
Emmet, John, and Canada Mike talk through two pieces: one on the superfluous men of history by Alex Gendler and another about bullshit jobs and people quitting the workforce by John Michael Greer. They talk about the Great Resignation, the strivewave, why men have been historically superluous, incels, and ponder if we need new ways to think of being modern. The New Superfluous Men by Alex Gendler That Untraversed Land by John Michael Greer Subscribe to our Patreon to get two exclusive episodes a...
Emmet and John forge ahead in the Lasch reading. This time they watch Lasch take on Burke, Marx, Weber, Tonnies, and more. They discuss development theory, the systematic view of history's progress, what they think Lasch is up to, what Schopenhauer did for them, and more. Subscribe to hear the rest!
It's Halloween season. To help celebrate, Emmet and frequent guest Josh Bregman sit down to talk about two favorites: The Terminator and A Nightmare on Elm Street. They talk about the slasher genre, collapse of American confidence, the terror of the past, the horror of the future, and more. Subscribe to our Patreon to get two exclusive episodes a month! Subscrube to Emmet's new podcast/newsletter Nuclear Barbarians. Closing Song: Copper & Stars by Planes Mistaken for Stars....
Political consultant and podcaster Luke Thompson joins Emmet to talk through the problem of political ossification. They talk through realignment theory, conceptions of political time, how party coalitions have changed over time, the shifting nature of American political institutions, and, of course, why nothing feels possible. Check out Luke's podcast with Jay Cost, Constitutionally Speaking . Subscribe to our Patreon to get two exclusive episodes a month! Closing Song: "Talk Anyway" by Found F...
Canada Mike fills in for John for the third installment of our series on Lasch's True and Only Heaven. Mike and Emmet detail Lasch's argument and consider the necessary relationship between progressive ideology and nostalgia. They talk about living in an eternal present, Cormac McCarthy as subverter of American tropes, the frontier as a "zone of innocence" and more. This a Teaser. Subscribe to get the rest of these episodes and the back catalog of our exclusive episodes. Patreon episodes come ou...
Emmet and John discuss the life and times of writer and director John Milius, looking specifically at his movies The Wind and the Lion and Conan the Barbarian. We talk about the Cold War, changes in the film industry, Milius' atavism, what makes Conan such a surprisingly beautiful an lyric film, and much, much more. Subscribe to our Patreon to get two exclusive episodes a month! Closing Song: "The Rain in Spain Drains Mainly From the Main Vein" by MANS....
Emmet sits down with historian, podcaster, and writer Sam Biagetti to talk about his latest piece for American Affairs, "Into the Fairy Castle: The Persistence of Victorian Liberalism." They about Gilbert and Sullivan, Borgen, the downfall of the Bernie movement, meritocracy and more. Subscribe to Sam's podcast here . ["Into the Fairy Castle: The Persistence of Victorian Liberalism" by Sam Biagetti](Into the Fairy Castle: The Persistence of Victorian Liberalism). Our Patreon. Closing Song: Rusty...
