58 episodes

Are you ready to burst your filter bubble? To hit pause on righteous anger? Principle of Charity injects curiosity and generosity back into difficult conversations, bringing together two expert guests with opposing views on big social issues.

But here’s the twist: as well as passionately advocating their own views, each guest is challenged to present the best, most generous version of the other’s argument.

This unique format comes from an ancient idea - the principle of charity - which tells us to seek the truth, not to win the fight; to truly understand the other before we instinctively reject them.

The podcast is hosted by Emile Sherman and Lloyd Vogelman. Emile is an Academy and Emmy Award-winning film & TV producer who’s obsessively curious about ideas and holds onto the naïve belief that a generous conversion is still the best way to get to the truth. Lloyd has a doctorate in psychology, spent years as a leader in the fight against apartheid before building reconciliation in South Africa, and describes himself as a recovering extremist who’s passionate about the potential to change our minds.
@PofCharity on Twitter, @PrincipleofCharity on Facebook and @PrincipleofCharityPodcast on Instagram.
You can find Emile at: @EmileSherman on Twitter, @EmileSherman on Linkedin,
You can find Lloyd at: @Lloydvogelman on Linkedin
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Producers:
Jonah Primo - Find at Jonahprimo.com or @Jonahprimo on Instagram
Bronwen Reid



Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Principle of Charity Emile Sherman, Lloyd Vogelman

    • Society & Culture
    • 4.8 • 115 Ratings

Are you ready to burst your filter bubble? To hit pause on righteous anger? Principle of Charity injects curiosity and generosity back into difficult conversations, bringing together two expert guests with opposing views on big social issues.

But here’s the twist: as well as passionately advocating their own views, each guest is challenged to present the best, most generous version of the other’s argument.

This unique format comes from an ancient idea - the principle of charity - which tells us to seek the truth, not to win the fight; to truly understand the other before we instinctively reject them.

The podcast is hosted by Emile Sherman and Lloyd Vogelman. Emile is an Academy and Emmy Award-winning film & TV producer who’s obsessively curious about ideas and holds onto the naïve belief that a generous conversion is still the best way to get to the truth. Lloyd has a doctorate in psychology, spent years as a leader in the fight against apartheid before building reconciliation in South Africa, and describes himself as a recovering extremist who’s passionate about the potential to change our minds.
@PofCharity on Twitter, @PrincipleofCharity on Facebook and @PrincipleofCharityPodcast on Instagram.
You can find Emile at: @EmileSherman on Twitter, @EmileSherman on Linkedin,
You can find Lloyd at: @Lloydvogelman on Linkedin
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Producers:
Jonah Primo - Find at Jonahprimo.com or @Jonahprimo on Instagram
Bronwen Reid



Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    Are Jews White? Pt. 2 On the Couch

    Are Jews White? Pt. 2 On the Couch

    With David Baddiel and Simon Sebag Montefiore.
    In Principle of Charity on the Couch, Lloyd has an unfiltered conversation with the guests, throws them curveballs, and gets into the personal side of Principle of Charity.
    David Baddiel is a comedian, author, screenwriter and television presenter.
     
    In 1992, he performed to 12,500 people with Rob Newman at the Wembley arena in the UK’s first ever arena comedy show and was credited as turning comedy into “The New Rock’n’Roll”. Alongside The Lightning Seeds, the pair also wrote the seminal football anthem Three Lions. David has made several acclaimed documentaries, including the 2016 travel documentary David Baddiel On The Silk Road (Discovery) and in 2017, The Trouble with Dad (Channel4). More recently he created and presented Confronting Holocaust Denial and Social Media, Anger and Us on BBC Two.
    Recently he published the Sunday Times bestselling non-fiction polemic Jews Don’t Count, and due to the success of this book, David has also written and presented a documentary under the same title for Channel 4, which was released in late 2022. David’s most recent non-fiction book, The God Desire, was published earlier this year.

    Simon Sebag Montefiore is the internationally bestselling author of prize-winning books that have been published in forty-eight languages. CATHERINE THE GREAT & POTEMKIN was shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize; STALIN: THE COURT OF THE RED TSAR won History Book of the Year Prize at the British Book Awards; YOUNG STALIN won the Costa Biography Award, the LA Times Book Prize for Biography, the Kreisky Prize and the Grand Prix de la Biographie Politique; JERUSALEM: THE BIOGRAPHY - A HISTORY OF THE MIDDLE EAST won the Jewish Book Council Book of the Year Prize and the Wenjin Book Prize in China; THE ROMANOVS: 1613-1918 won the Lupicaia del Terriccio Book Prize. He is the author of the Moscow Trilogy of novels: SASHENKA, RED SKY AT NOON and ONE NIGHT IN WINTER, which won the Political Fiction Book of the Year Award. His latest book is THE WORLD: A FAMILY HISTORY OF HUMANITY which has been a NYT and Sunday Times top ten bestseller.
    CREDITS
    Your hosts are Lloyd Vogelman and Emile Sherman
     
    This podcast is proud to partner with The Ethics Centre
    Find Lloyd @LloydVogelman on Linked in
    Find Emile @EmileSherman on Linked In and X
    Find Jonah at jonahprimo.com or @JonahPrimo on Instagram
     
    Find Danielle at danielleharvey.com.au
      


    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    • 18 min
    Are Jews White?

    Are Jews White?

    In this episode we spend time with David Baddiel and Simon Sebag Montefiore and ask -  ​​Where do Jews really come from? Are they white or people of colour? And how should we deal with the ethnic diversity within Jewish populations, with differences between Ashkenazi, Sephardi and Mizrachi Jews?
     
    Questions around whether Jews are white or people of colour has become a fraught issue. In an ideal world (or the ideal for at least most of us in the multicultural liberal west,) it shouldn’t matter. However, race, ethnicity and politics have always been intertwined, and this question takes us to some surprising places in the battle of racial politics. 
     
    In particular, both the far right and now the progressive left are drawing a lot of meaning from the question ‘are Jews white or people of colour?’, with Jews seemingly on the wrong side of each of their equations. They are non-white for the far right, and quintessentially white for the progressive left. 
     
    To help answer this question and more, we have two guests with very different lenses. Our first, Simon Sebag Montefiore, is one of the world’s leading historians. He outlines the historical, archaeological and genetic consensus, and any counterviews, on where Jews come from and how Jewish populations have moved through the ages. We also have author, comedian and documentarian David Baddiel to help with the cultural and political significance of this question, and to explore whether Jews are privileged enough to be ‘deemed’ white, regardless of their Middle Eastern heritage. 

    BIOS
    David Baddiel is a comedian, author, screenwriter and television presenter.
     
    In 1992, he performed to 12,500 people with Rob Newman at the Wembley arena in the UK’s first ever arena comedy show and was credited as turning comedy into “The New Rock’n’Roll”. Alongside The Lightning Seeds, the pair also wrote the seminal football anthem Three Lions. David has made several acclaimed documentaries, including the 2016 travel documentary David Baddiel On The Silk Road (Discovery) and in 2017, The Trouble with Dad (Channel4). More recently he created and presented Confronting Holocaust Denial and Social Media, Anger and Us on BBC Two.
    Recently he published the Sunday Times bestselling non-fiction polemic Jews Don’t Count, and due to the success of this book, David has also written and presented a documentary under the same title for Channel 4, which was released in late 2022. David’s most recent non-fiction book, The God Desire, was published earlier this year.

    Simon Sebag Montefiore is the internationally bestselling author of prize-winning books that have been published in forty-eight languages. CATHERINE THE GREAT & POTEMKIN was shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize; STALIN: THE COURT OF THE RED TSAR won History Book of the Year Prize at the British Book Awards; YOUNG STALIN won the Costa Biography Award, the LA Times Book Prize for Biography, the Kreisky Prize and the Grand Prix de la Biographie Politique; JERUSALEM: THE BIOGRAPHY -   A HISTORY OF THE MIDDLE EAST  won the Jewish Book Council Book of the Year Prize and the Wenjin Book Prize in China; THE ROMANOVS: 1613-1918 won the Lupicaia del Terriccio Book Prize. He is the author of the Moscow Trilogy of novels: SASHENKA, RED SKY AT NOON and ONE NIGHT IN WINTER, which won the Political Fiction Book of the Year Award.  His latest book is THE WORLD:   A FAMILY HISTORY OF HUMANITY which has been a NYT and Sunday Times top ten bestseller.



    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    • 49 min
    Does Our Ethnic Heritage Matter? Pt. 2 On the Couch

    Does Our Ethnic Heritage Matter? Pt. 2 On the Couch

    Featuring the wonderful Benjamin Law and Professor John Rasko AO. In Principle of Charity on the Couch, Lloyd has an unfiltered conversation with the guests, throws them curveballs, and gets into the personal side of Principle of Charity.
    BIOS
     
    Benjamin Law is an Australian writer and broadcaster. He’s the author of The Family Law (2010), Gaysia (2013), the Quarterly Essay Moral Panic 101 (2017) and editor of Growing Up Queer in Australia (2019). Benjamin is also an AWGIE Award-winning screenwriter. He’s the co-executive producer, co-creator and co-writer of the Netflix comedy-drama Wellmania (2023), playwright of Melbourne Theatre Company’s sold-out play Torch the Place (2020), and creator and co-writer of three seasons of the award-winning SBS/Hulu/Comedy Central Asia TV series The Family Law (2016–2019).
     
    Benjamin works and lives on Gadigal Country, part of the Eora Nation (Sydney). He is a board member of Story Factory, committee member of the Jesse Cox Audio Fellowship and ambassador for Plan Australia, the Australian Literacy and Numeracy Foundation, Victorian Pride Centre, Bridge for Asylum Seekers and the Pinnacle Foundation.
     
    Professor John Rasko AO is internationally renowned as Australia’s pioneer in the clinical application of adult stem cells and gene therapies. As a clinical hematologist, pathologist and scientist with a renowned track record in gene and stem cell therapy, experimental haematology and molecular biology he has published over 220 academic papers. He is Deputy Director and leads the Program in Gene and Stem Cell Therapy Program at The Centenary Institute and is Head, Department of Cell & Molecular Therapies at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Sydney.
    CREDITS
    Your hosts are Lloyd Vogelman and Emile Sherman
     
    This podcast is proud to partner with The Ethics Centre
    Find Lloyd @LloydVogelman on Linked in
    Find Emile @EmileSherman on Linked In and X
    This podcast is produced by Jonah Primo and Danielle Harvey
    Find Jonah at jonahprimo.com or @JonahPrimo on Instagram
     
    Find Danielle at danielleharvey.com.au
      
    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    • 40 min
    Does Our Ethnic Heritage Matter?

    Does Our Ethnic Heritage Matter?

    Featuring the wonderful Benjamin Law and Professor John Rasko AO
    In this episode with the help of a cultural critic and a genetic expert we consider how to best make sense of our ancestral past and the dangers of over identifying with tribes alongside the very real opportunities science is giving us to change our genetics.
     
    While we are all unique individuals, who of course come from families and a line of ancestors, in the end we are responsible for our own lives. While we may look to our ancestry for helpful hints as to how to live well, how much, if at all, should our heritage define or constrain us? 
     
    On a genetic level we have inherited some of the traits of our forebears, and even if, for example the colour of our skin, hair or facial features does express our genetic connection to race, that necessarily ‘mean’ something to us or should it be embraced? What about inherited genetic disorders, are there responsibilities around passing these on that need to be considered?
     
    While knowing which ‘tribe’ we come from can offer a deep sense of belonging, even pride, for some the reminder of our heritage is irrelevant or even shameful or simply unhelpful. The deep psychological pull towards identifying as part of a ‘tribe’ can be particularly true if we are discriminated against because of your heritage and background. If you’re attacked because you’re black, Islamic, Asian, Jewish, deaf etc, you quickly find that you are part of that tribe, whether it’s personally important to you or not.
     
    There are of course many dangers of over-identifying with tribes. Tribal thinking is always fraught with danger - any look at history will tell you that. These questions about whether our heritage matters, and what it means, have also become heavily politicised.
     
    We make sense of our lives through the stories we tell ourselves. Many of us seek out our ancestry, our tribe, as a way of knowing who we are. Yet inherited genes from past individuals, randomly shaken up in their journey across generations and finally passed from our parents to us are just that – random. So how much should our ethnic heritage matter, and is it the most important part of our individual stories?
     
     
    BIOS
     
    Benjamin Law is an Australian writer and broadcaster. He’s the author of The Family Law (2010), and editor of Growing Up Queer in Australia (2019). Benjamin is also an AWGIE Award-winning screenwriter. He’s the co-executive producer, co-creator and co-writer of the Netflix comedy-drama Wellmania (2023), playwright of Melbourne Theatre Company’s sold-out play Torch the Place (2020), and creator and co-writer of three seasons of the award-winning SBS/Hulu/Comedy Central Asia TV series The Family Law (2016–2019).
     
    Professor John Rasko AO is internationally renowned as Australia’s pioneer in the clinical application of adult stem cells and gene therapies. As a clinical hematologist, pathologist and scientist he has published over 220 academic papers. He is Deputy Director and leads the Program in Gene and Stem Cell Therapy Program at The Centenary Institute and is Head, Department of Cell & Molecular Therapies at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Sydney.
    CREDITS
    Your hosts are Lloyd Vogelman and Emile Sherman
     
    This podcast is proud to partner with The Ethics Centre
    Find Lloyd @LloydVogelman on Linked in
    Find Emile @EmileSherman on Linked In and X
    Find Jonah at jonahprimo.com or @JonahPrimo on Instagram
     
    Find Danielle at danielleharvey.com.au
      


    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    • 54 min
    Libertarian vs Indigenous Ways, Pt. 2 On the Couch

    Libertarian vs Indigenous Ways, Pt. 2 On the Couch

    In Principle of Charity on the Couch, Lloyd has an unfiltered conversation with the guests, throws them curveballs, and gets into the personal side of Principle of Charity.
    BIOS
    Tyson Yunkaporta is an Aboriginal scholar, founder of the Indigenous Knowledge Systems Lab at Deakin University in Melbourne, and author of Sand Talk. His work focuses on applying Indigenous methods of inquiry to resolve complex issues and explore global crises.
    John Humphreys is the Chief Economist at The Australian Taxpayers' Alliance. He has worked previously as a policy analyst for the Australian Treasury. John was the founder of the Australian Libertarian Society, the Liberal Democratic Party (now called "Libertarian Party"), and the Friedman Conference. He also ran a research centre and education charity in Cambodia for many years, for which he was awarded a knighthood in 2016. 

    CREDITS
    Your hosts are Lloyd Vogelman and Emile Sherman
     
    This podcast is proud to partner with The Ethics Centre
    Find Lloyd @LloydVogelman on Linked in
    Find Emile @EmileSherman on Linked In and X
    This podcast is produced by Jonah Primo and Danielle Harvey
    Find Jonah at jonahprimo.com or @JonahPrimo on Instagram
     
    Find Danielle at danielleharvey.com.au
      
    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    • 28 min
    Libertarian vs Indigenous Ways: Which is the better model for society?

    Libertarian vs Indigenous Ways: Which is the better model for society?

    In this episode we contrast two very different ways of seeing the world — Libertarianism and Indigenous Ways, to consider which model is better for society. 

    Libertarianism, with a focus on the version of this political philosophy that came about in the second half of the 20th century, usually associated with the centre right, does in fact cut across traditional left /right lines. It sees our individual liberty, our freedom as the most important political value. It's a political philosophy that values civil liberties, competitive markets, private property and free speech. It sees the government as a poor substitute for voluntary community and dislikes government intervention. Not just because governments may be corrupt or inefficient, but because of the real threat of force that lies at the base of all laws to coerce us to do what we may not want to do. Libertarianism sits on the extreme, but still well within a general Western enlightenment worldview with other pillars like capitalism and free functioning markets. One could say that the purpose that sits behind this entire worldview is the flourishing of the individual. 

    In contrast to libertarianism we consider Indigenous Australian knowledge systems, which echo many First Nations’ ways of seeing the world. Here the individual is just one node in a hugely complex system of relationships that extend to the family, to community, to ancestors, to future generations, to animals and to the land — which is also seen to be alive and sentient — and to the creation stories themselves. While this system recognises we have individual desires and we should honour our individuality, it is driven by prioritising our relationships and obligations to all those groups mentioned above with an overarching sense of custodianship for a story that started in creation and will continue long after we are gone. 
    There are some interesting crossovers between the two worldviews, such as a distrust of centralised top-down systems of control and a belief in the power of emergent systems that come from the web of human interactions, however these are two very different ways of seeing the role of the individual and their relationships and responsibilities in and to society. 
    This episode contains some coarse language.

    BIOS
    Tyson Yunkaporta is an Aboriginal scholar, founder of the Indigenous Knowledge Systems Lab at Deakin University in Melbourne, and author of Sand Talk. His work focuses on applying Indigenous methods of inquiry to resolve complex issues and explore global crises.
    John Humphreys is the Chief Economist at The Australian Taxpayers' Alliance. He has worked previously as a policy analyst for the Australian Treasury. John was the founder of the Australian Libertarian Society, the Liberal Democratic Party (now called "Libertarian Party"), and the Friedman Conference. He also ran a research centre and education charity in Cambodia for many years, for which he was awarded a knighthood in 2016. 

    CREDITS
    Your hosts are Lloyd Vogelman and Emile Sherman
     
    This podcast is proud to partner with The Ethics Centre
    Find Lloyd @LloydVogelman on Linked in
    Find Emile @EmileSherman on Linked In and X
    This podcast is produced by Jonah Primo and Danielle Harvey
    Find Jonah at jonahprimo.com or @JonahPrimo on Instagram
     
    Find Danielle at danielleharvey.com.au
      
    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    • 55 min

Customer Reviews

4.8 out of 5
115 Ratings

115 Ratings

MaxHomaei ,

Nourishment food for the intellect

This podcast truly delivers on its promise of injecting curiosity and generosity into the conversations they present about the complex issues of our time. I’ve been looking for something that is intellectually stimulating and emotionally balanced, and this podcast does an incredible job delivering that with their thoughtful selection of topics and guests.

Read The Corner: David Simon ,

Absolutely love this podcast

I definitely recommend

ate a bone ,

My favourite podcast

I love The Principle of Charity. It’s gentle, thoughtful and a wonderful way to make you think, make you more compassionate, and make your opinions less ferocious.

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