The PC Police Outlaw Make-Believe." "Meet the Renegades of the Intellectual Dark Web." "The Roots of Campus Hatred." "End DEI."

These articles all have something in common: they were written by Bari Weiss. Weiss, the New York Times opinion editor and columnist turned horseshoe theorist media proprietor, has made a name for herself as a victim, and enemy, of that perennial right-wing bogeyman: so-called wokeness. For over a decade now, Weiss has taken to the pages of major news media to complain, vilified — and sometimes target — college kids and protesters who won’t let her and the fascistic company she keeps, Jordan Peterson, Ben Shapiro, and the like, speak their minds as loudly and publicly as possible.

There is, of course, a comical level of irony here. Amid her claims of being silenced and repressed by a hostile left, Weiss has been paid to voice her opinions in legacy paper after legacy paper and been given millions by venture capital firms to start her own media company, The Free Press, and her so-called "university," the University of Austin. And despite her insistence that mainstream institutions are too intolerant of heterodox views like hers, she's warmly embraced on CNN broadcasts, in the pages of her former employer, The New York Times, and has been given glowing profiles in Vanity Fair, Los Angeles Magazine, Ha'aretz, The Information, and the Financial Times.

On this episode, we discuss the rise of Bari Weiss Silicon Valley-funded media empire, the trope of the Iconoclast rebel, truth-telling media lightening rod with banal conservative political positions, and the broader, seemingly uniquely American psychological need, and branding convention, for people with 95% boilerplate rightwing positions to see themselves as persecuted outsiders who don’t fit into any labels.   

Our guest is Discourse Blog's Katherine Krueger.

Bari Weiss, The 'University' of Austin, and the Silicon Valley-Funded Faux-Iconoclast Media Industry

"Salvadoran Ties Bloodshed To a 'Culture of Violence'", reported The New York Times in 1981. "The violence in Lebanon is casual, random, and probably addicting," stated the Honolulu Star-Advertiser in 1985. "Muslim life is cheap, most notably to Muslims," wrote long-time New Republic publisher and editor-in-chief Marty Peretz in 2010.

There’s a recurring theme within media coverage of subjugated people in the US and around the world: they’re mindlessly, inherently savage. Whether the subject is immigrants from Central and South America, Black populations in major American cities, or people in Lebanon or Palestine, we’re repeatedly told that any violence they may be subjected to or carry out themselves is inevitable, purposeless, and baked into their "culture."

The pathologizing of violence in certain racialized communities is one side of the coin. The other side of the coin, which reinforces this notion, is the equally sinister concept of selective empathy. It’s a conditional sense of compassion, reserved for victims who media deem deserving—say, Ukrainian victims of Russia’s invasion—and not for those who media deem undeserving, like Palestinians under siege by Israel in Gaza. What motivates this asymmetry, and how does it shape public understandings of suffering throughout the world? How is empathy as a form of media currency central to getting the public to care about victims of certain violence, while a lack of empathy––and even worse, pathologizing violence in certain communities––conditions the public to not care about those whose deaths those in power would rather not talk about, much less humanize.

In this episode, we look at the concept of selective empathy in media coverage, examining how it continues centuries-old campaigns of dehumanization – particularly against Arab, Black, and Latino people – bifurcates victims of global violence into the deserving and the undeserving, and influences contemporary opinion on everything from pain tolerance to criminal-legal policy.

Our guest is Dr. Muhannad Ayyash.

Episode 212: Gaza and the Political Utility of Selective Empathy

This week we catch up on news at the global scale, as well as try to answer why exactly so many people cheered on the public execution of a health insurance CEO. Finally we take a quick look at Trump's (current) nominee(s) for Secretary of Defense. 

Support us on Patreon: www.patreon.com/trillbillyworkersparty

Episode 370: Who Checks The Balances

This week we touch on a few world news topics, and then develop a new TV show inspired by Taylor Sheridan's "The Landman"

Support us on Patreon: www.patreon.com/trillbillyworkersparty

Episode 371: Enter Landman

We’re joined by Dylan Saba of Palestine Legal to talk about terror designations, state repressions, Project Esther, and the anti-BDS laws that 38 states have adopted. Special guest Abby Martin joins us at the end to talk about her court case. 

Anti-Palestinian at the Core: The Origins and Growing Dangers of U.S. Antiterrorism Law: https://ccrjustice.org/anti-palestinian-core-origins-and-growing-dangers-us-antiterrorism-law

Discover more episodes at podcast.trueanon.com

Episode 426: Palestine... Legal?

Annie Kelly brings Jake, Julian, and Travis tales of the lesser known figures of the European witch hunts during the early modern period: the skeptics who openly doubted that every accused woman was actually a witch.

At the time, it was common for village communities in England, Spain, and France to accuse local women of cursing cows and similar satanic mischief. But a handful of men didn’t believe the mainstream belief that witchcraft was widespread. Doubts were raised by the Spanish royal physician Andrés Fernández de Laguna, the English gentleman Reginald Scot, and the inquisitor Alonso de Salazar Frías. Salazar even established rules on investigating witchcraft that set a high standard of proof. This subsequently saved an untold number of accused witches from being hanged or burned at the stake.

What can all of this tell us about the modern right’s use of the language of demonology to describe their enemies? Listen to get exclusive analysis from the National Baby.

To get a better background on the history of witch hunting, Annie interviewed Professor Marion Gibson from the University of Exeter, and author of the book Witchcraft: A History in 13 Trials.


Subscribe for $5 a month to get all the premium episodes:
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Annie Kelly
https://bsky.app/profile/annieknk.bsky.social

Witchcraft: A History in 13 Trials by Marion Gibson
https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Witchcraft/Marion-Gibson/9781668002438


Editing by Corey Klotz. Theme by Nick Sena. Additional music by Pontus Berghe. Theme Vocals by THEY/LIVE (https://instagram.com/theyylivve / https://sptfy.com/QrDm). Cover Art by Pedro Correa: (https://pedrocorrea.com)

https://qaapodcast.com

QAA was known as the QAnon Anonymous podcast.


Witchcraft Skeptics And The Spanish Inquisition (E306)

In this News Brief, we talk to Joyce Ajlouny of the American Friends Service Committee, discuss a recent episode where the New York Times refused to run an AFSC pro-ceasefire ad with the word "genocide" in it, and detail the broader battle within liberalism over labeling the US and Israel's "war" as genocide––and what it would entail if they did.  

News Brief: NYT Bars Quakers From Using "Genocide" in Ad and Liberal Squeamishness Over the "G" Word

"Clinton seeks common ground with Republicans," reported the Associated Press in 1994. "Obama hosts dinner, urges bipartisanship," announced the AP again, in 2009. "Resist Trump? On Immigration, Top Democrats See Room for Compromise," stated The New York Times in late 2024.

For decades, we’ve heard Democratic policymakers extol the virtues of working with Republicans. Through a series of stock terms, e.g. bipartisanship, finding common ground, reaching across the aisle, compromising, they tout their willingness to set aside their political differences with Republicans in order to stop quibbling, quit stalling, work pragmatically, and––the holiest of the holies––Get Things Done.

This all might sound well and good; surely an active government is better than an idle, incapacitated one. But which things, exactly, are getting done? Why is it that the act of making decisions or passing legislation is deemed more important to elected officials than the actual content of those decisions and legislation? And how does an incurious, largely compliant media contribute to the harms of a Democratic party that, in its embrace of Republican ideology under the seeming noble banner of "bipartisanship" continues to move further to the right on key issues?

On this episode, we dissect the popular appeal for bipartisanship, examine how folksy calls for “Washington” to “work together” more often than not serve to promote war, austerity, anti-LBGTQ policies and crackdown on vulnerable migrants, and show how this seemingly high minded formulation serves to push Republicans further right and launder the Democrats’ increasingly conservative political agenda.

Our guest is journalist and author Malaika Jabali.

Episode 215: "Bipartisanship" as High-Minded Rhetorical Cover for Pushing Rightwing Policies

Welcome to DOGE-stan! We take stock of the Trump admin’s early chaos including the plan to annex Gaza, sending American prisoners to El Salvador, and the goldbuggery of the Mar-A-Lago Accords. 

Discover more episodes at podcast.trueanon.com

Call the tip line at (646) 801-1129

Episode 437: Fork in the Road

Kath joins us for our annual review of the Big Game spectacle. We give our appraisal of what this year’s ad slate says about the state of American culture, plus reactions to Kendrick Lamar’s halftime show, and how conservatives continue to be oppressed by the TV. Then the Washington Post’s Jeff Stein joins us to discuss his reporting on what exactly Elon Musk & the DOGE team are trying to do to the federal government.

Jeff’s piece on Elon & DOGE: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/02/08/doge-musk-goals/

If you’re in LA, check out Jacques & Grace’s Game Show Pig variety show at the Loge Room this Wednesday, 2/12: https://www.lodgeroomhlp.com/shows/game-show-pig/

Chapo Trap House

907 - Big Balls feat. Kath Krueger & Jeff Stein (2/10/25)

In this News Brief, we interview journalist and author Eoin Higgins about his new book, "Owned: How Tech Billionaires on the Right Bought the Loudest Voices on the Left," discuss the new model of tech billionaire funding, and detail how some of the biggest names in Left media became MAGA-aligned, Tucker-boosting petty, score-settlers.

News Brief: Silicon Valley Patronage, How To Drift Right, and the New Conservative Media Ecosystem

Citations Needed is a podcast about the media, power, PR, and the history of bullshit. It is hosted by Nima Shirazi and Adam Johnson, and produced by Florence Barrau-Adams.

Episode 212: Gaza and the Political Utility of Selective Empathy

Citations Needed Podcast

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